IMC 2019 Shadow PC

Background

To provide an educational experience by exposing students to a review process and to subsequently train the next generation of program committee (PC) members, the ACM IMC 2019 TPC would like to make submitted papers available to the shadow PC. Shadow PCs allow students and others interested in future PC service to read submitted papers and go through the reviewing process, ultimately arriving at a shadow conference program. This opportunity allows future PC members to learn first-hand about the peer-review process and gain experience as a reviewer.

The shadow PC process is run on a different system and the shadow PC reviewers will not have any access to the real reviews, the names of the real reviewers, or any other data such as relative rankings. Shadow PC reviewers will have to abide by the same rules and restrictions applicable to regular PC members. This includes, but is not limited to, rules against discussing the papers outside of the PC context, or using in any way results from reviewed papers before such papers have been published. Delegated reviews (i.e., external reviews) are not allowed for the shadow PC.

Shadow PC Chairs (contact: imc19shadowtpcchairs@lists.fu-berlin.de)

Call for applications for Shadow PC

The Shadow PC will consist of PhD students, postdocs, early-career academics, and junior researchers and will provide reviews on a subset of submissions to the conference. Paper authors can choose to opt-in for shadow reviews.

The IMC Shadow PC will function much like an independent version of the “Senior” PC. It will therefore involve deciding the papers it would have selected (note that only authors will learn the “shadow” fate of their own papers; it will have no impact on the actual IMC PC process). Shadow PC members will be expected to review a full load of 5-10 papers (depending on the number of submissions selected for the Shadow PC process) on time and participate in online discussion, as well as follow the ethical standards of peer review. Shadow PC members will also be required to do a small amount of reading about the PC process. Shadow PC members must respect the anonymity of the review process and not share which papers they have reviewed or solicit sub-reviews. Shadow PC members who do not adhere to the review deadlines will be excluded from the process. Shadow PC reviews will be made available (anonymized) to the authors.

What differs from common Shadow TPCs?

We also plan to use the Shadow PC as a means to experiment with new approaches to managing the TPC decision process. We will implement an A/B experiment to compare the experience of in-person vs. remote meetings. As part of this, the IMC Shadow PC will be split in two groups. (i) Those who will attend an in-person Shadow PC meeting, held at the end of July in London; (ii) Those who will attend an online meeting via professional video conferencing distributed among two or more remote sites, also held in July. Every participant needs to decide up front which group he or she would like to join. We assume that members based in Europe can travel easier and expect from them to attend the one-day in-person meeting. If asked to participate in the in-person meeting, Shadow PC members should strive to attend.

To get a better idea why you should participate in the IMC Shadow TPC, you may want to read the report by Timm Böttger, one of the participants of the IMC Shadow TPC 2018: http://eecs.qmul.ac.uk/~boettget/imc18-shadowpc/.

How to apply?

If you are interested in participating, please apply by uploading your application material to https://imc19shadowpc.hotcrp.com/ submission site by May 1, 2019, Midnight Pacific time. Your application should consist of a single PDF file which includes a CV and a brief (0.25-1 page) motivation statement explaining why you’d like to participate in the shadow PC. Be sure to include your name, position/year of study, areas of research experience, publications (feel free to include tech reports, papers under submission/preparation, and unreviewed manuscripts, as long as you indicate them as such) or past reviewing experience (it is okay to have none).

Important Dates

Deadline to apply for Shadow PC May 1, 2019 (Midnight Pacific time)
Notification of acceptance May 7, 2019
Shadow review deadline (1st round reviews) June 15, 2019
Shadow review deadline (2nd round reviews) July 15, 2019
Shadow online discussion period July 15 - July 25, 2019
Shadow PC meeting (online) July 26, 2019
Shadow PC meeting (in-person) July 29, 2019

Shadow PC

Group A (attending in-person meeting)

Group B (attending remote meeting)