Panel Review Guidelines
Review Timeline
| Reviewing Phase | Start Date | End Date |
|---|---|---|
| Bidding | Saturday, August 29, 2020 | Wednesday, September 2, 2020 |
| Reviewing | Thursday, September 3, 2020 | Wednesday, September 16, 2020 |
| Discussion & Recommendations | Thursday, September 17, 2020 | Wednesday, September 23, 2020 |
Overview
Current as of August 13 2020
Panel sessions provide an opportunity for expert panel members to present their views on a specific topic and then to discuss these views among themselves and with the audience. Usually a panel session starts with a brief introduction of the panel topic and the participants, followed by short presentations by the panelists giving their views. They are scheduled in standard conference spaces. The session must allow sufficient opportunity (about 30 minutes) for an interactive question and answer period involving both the panelists and the audience.
A typical panel will consist of four participants, including the moderator. Limiting a panel to four participants allows sufficient time for audience questions. Proposals with more than four panelists must convincingly show that all panelists will be able to speak, and the audience able to respond, within the session time.
Criteria used in reviewing the proposals include the likely level of interest of the topic, the presence of panel members with multiple perspectives on the topic, and the likelihood that the panel will leave sufficient time for audience participation.
If the proposal is accepted, all presenters listed in the panel description will be required to register for the conference and to participate in the session.
Single-Anonymous Review Process
Initial submissions to the Panels track are reviewed with the single-anonymous review process, where the submissions are not anonymized but reviewers are anonymous to each other and to the authors. During the discussion of a submission in EasyChair, reviewers can refer to each other by their reviewer number on that submission’s review.
Review Guidelines
SIGCSE Technical Symposium panel proposals are reviewed using EasyChair. Each proposal is assigned to at least three reviewers.
Please provide constructive feedback and clearly justify your choice of rating to help the authors. A review that gives a low score with no written comments is not helpful to the authors since it simply tells the authors that they have been unsuccessful, with no indication of how or why.
The review form for panels will ask you to comment specifically on three aspects of the proposal, described below. Please refer to the prompts below as you write your review.
- Relevance and Interest
- Is the panel topic clearly stated?
- Are the benefits to the SIGCSE audience clearly indicated? Is the panel topic of interest to the SIGCSE community?
- Structure & Plan for Audience Participation
- Is there an overview of the panel structure?
- Does the proposed structure include time for a brief introduction of the topic and the panelists?
- Does the proposed structure include time for panelists to present their view?
- Does the proposed structure allow sufficient time for an interactive question and answer period between the audience and panelists (30 mins)?
- Could the panel still be effective if given a shorter session?
- Do the panelists have a strong plan for the virtual format?
- Panelist considerations
- Does the proposal clearly identify the panelists (i.e., name and affiliation) and describe their expertise related to the topic, as well as panelists from diverse groups?
- Is the panel composed of panelists that represent multiple/diverse views on the topic?
- Does the proposal clearly identify no more than 4 panelists, including the moderator?
- If there are more than 4 panelists, are each of the panelists needed for representing a full range of perspectives on the panel topic?
While your review text should clearly support your scores and recommendation, please do not include your preference for acceptance or rejection of a submission in the feedback to the authors. Instead, use the provided radio buttons to make a recommendation (the authors will not see this) based on your summary review and provide any details that refer to your recommendation directly in the confidential comments to the APC or track chairs. Remember that as a reviewer, you will only see a small portion of the submissions, so one that you recommend for acceptance may be rejected when considering the other reviewer recommendations and the full set of submissions.
Discussion
The discussion and recommendation period provides the opportunity for the Track Chairs to discuss reviews and feedback so they can provide the best recommendation for acceptance or rejection to the Program Chairs and that the submission is given full consideration in the review process. We ask that Reviewers engage in discussion when prompted by other reviewers, the Track Chairs by using the Comments feature of EasyChair. During this period you will be able to revise your review based on the discussion, but you are not required to do so.
The Track Chairs will make a final recommendation to the Program Chairs from your feedback.
Recalcitrant Reviewers
Reviewers who don’t submit reviews, have reviews with limited constructive feedback, or who submit inappropriate reviews will be removed from the reviewer list (as per SIGCSE policy). Recalcitrant reviewers will be informed of their removal from the reviewer list. Reviewers with repeated offenses (two within a three year period) will be removed from SIGCSE reviewing for three years.