ACM SIGCOMM 2022 Call for Travel Grants Applications

Support for SIGCOMM 2022 travel grants will be available to students, postdocs, and young faculty early in their career with limited startup funds. We would like to encourage all of you to apply. This year, the Conference Organizing Committee is working hard to provide as much travel support to as many conference attendees as possible. Travel support has been provided from several different supporting organizations. Through this support, we will be able to assist tens of attendees. Still, resources are limited, thus, most probably, only part of the well-justified requests can be granted.

In addition to standard travel grants open to the above-mentioned academic participants, we also have special support to fund grants that will increase the diversity of the SIGCOMM conference:

The N2Women travel grant is awarded to women researchers. Its awarding will be overseen by the N2Women group in coordination with the SIG.

SIGCOMM’s GeoDiversity Travel Grant is for applicants preferably in their early career and with limited startup fund (applicants who are at most five years of full-time, full-level [non-postdoc] post-PhD employment will be given higher priority), and may be graduate students or postdocs. These grants are to promote exchange between the SIGCOMM community and networking researchers/students from countries historically under-represented at SIGCOMM conferences (e.g. Latin America, Africa, and parts of Asia). GeoDiversity Travel Grants are likely to be funded at a higher level (see https://sigcomm.org/for-authors/geodiversity-travel-grants).

Please consider the following important information before applying: The application process is the same for all types of attendees and all sources of funding, and is described in the rest of this page. Travel grant awards are meant to partially cover the cost of attending and participating in SIGCOMM 2022. The only travel expenses that reimbursements can be used towards are: transportation, hotel, and conference registration. Note that the award recipients will need to pay for the expenses ahead of time and get reimbursed after the conference. The exact number of awards will depend on the availability of funds and will be determined as funding amounts are finalized.

Selection Criteria

The following criteria will be used in the selection process:

Preference will be given to applicants that do not present a paper in the conference. The rationale for this criterion is that the participation costs for a presenting author should be covered by their home institution. Note that this preference applies to non-presenter authors, provided that they articulate a compelling case for why their home institution cannot cover the costs of their attendance in their application.
Students presenting posters are encouraged to apply though. The rationale is to support the participation of students who do not present papers but contribute to the conference in other ways.
Evidence of a serious interest in networking, as demonstrated by coursework and/or project experience, will be required. Advanced students close to graduation or in the job market will also be given priority, when possible.
We particularly encourage participation of women and under-represented minorities. Special attention will be given to applicants from minority-serving institutions.
After giving priority to the above criteria, (co-)authors of papers may be considered but will be given lower priority. The rationale is to support people that contribute to the conference and cannot attend otherwise due to budget or other constraints. (An example is a student who is a second author but does not present and would not be able to attend the conference otherwise. Another example is a postdoc who presents work with a past affiliation or without affiliation and thus is not supported either by his/her past or current institution. In both cases, the applicant and the letter-writer should explain in their letters why it is impossible to support the applicant from other sources.)

Where and How to Apply

All application materials (applicant’s info, CV, and letters compiled into ONE PDF) should be submitted electronically via https://sigcomm22travel.hotcrp.com

Use your full name and surname as the title of the submission. The applicant should create an account in the submission system and upload AS ONE PDF:

An application letter, including the applicant’s info (up to 2 pages)
An up-to-date CV (up to 4 pages), and
A letter from their supervisor (PhD adviser for students, PhD or postdoc adviser for postdocs, or supervisor/department chair for faculty/researchers). The recommendation letter can be directly uploaded by the applicant during the application process (Recommended). Alternatively, the advisor can directly email the recommendation letter to the travel grant co-chairs if confidentiality is a concern.

The applicant’s letter should be based on this template and include the following sections:

An explicit identification of (a) the applicant’s current country of study or work, (b) academic status (student, postdoc, or junior faculty member), (c) whether the applicant qualifies for a GeoDiversity Travel Grant (see above), and (d) whether the applicant would like to be considered for the N2Women travel grant.
Whether the applicant is the presenter of a paper, or has submitted a poster or demo; and whether the applicant has applied for the ACM Student Research Competition (SRC);
A brief summary of where the applicant is studying/working (provide a URL for a home page if one exists) and who the applicant’s advisor/supervisor is; any additional information the applicant feels is relevant to support their case;
A brief summary of research interests and plans for future research;
Why the conference attendance is important to the applicant’s research; and
A cost estimate of the trip, listing the cost of airfare, hotel, and the source of any price quote.
Optionally, a statement of how the applicant will increase the diversity of SIGCOMM’s attendees may be included.

The supervisor’s letter should be clearly divided in the following sections:

The applicant’s good standing in the institution;
Explain why the applicant would benefit from attending SIGCOMM as well as how he/she could contribute to the conference; and
Explain the current funding status and why the applicant is in need of the grant. It should also show commitment to supplement the travel award (to cover remaining costs) to enable the student to attend SIGCOMM.

Travel grants are provided by NSF and ACM SIGCOMM, and N2Women.