Doctoral Consortium
The Sixteenth International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers & Accessibility (ASSETS 2014) invites doctoral students to apply for participation in the Doctoral Consortium. This consortium provides a great opportunity to doctoral students to share and discuss their research with other students, and a panel of established researchers.
Participants in the Doctoral Consortium
The ASSETS Doctoral Consortium brings together both student and faculty participants.
Chairs

Towson University, USA

CRIM, Canada
Panel Members

UCSC, USA

IBM Research, USA

U. of Manchester, UK

U. of Dundee, UK

U. of Maryland, USA
How to Submit
Please submit all required documents (see below for further details) via email: dc-assets14@acm.org
How the Consortium Will Work
The Consortium will be held on Sunday, October 19th in Rochester, New York, USA. During the Consortium, each student will make a formal presentation about his or her doctoral research. Feedback will be given by each member of the faculty panel, as well as by the other student participants. Discussion will be encouraged.The feedback will be geared toward helping student participants understand and articulate how their work is positioned, relative to other research on Assistive Technologies, Universal Accessibility, and Universal Usability. Feedback will also address whether their topics are adequately focused for thesis research projects, whether their methods are correctly chosen and applied, and whether their results are being appropriately analyzed and presented.
Student participants will also present their research in the main conference during a poster session that is dedicated specifically to the work of the Doctoral Consortium participants. This will allow conference attendees to interact with, and ask questions of, the Doctoral Consortium participants, and will allow the participants the opportunity to get feedback from a larger audience.
Goals of the Consortium
The overall goals of the Consortium are to:
The overall purpose of the Consortium is to encourage and prepare a group of promising young researchers dedicated to Assistive Technologies, Universal Accessibility, and Universal Usability.
Who Should Apply
The purpose of the Doctoral Consortium is to provide feedback to Doctoral candidates at an early stage of their research, in order to help guide and shape their research program. Students submitting proposals to the Doctoral Consortium may also submit a different piece of work to the Student Research Competition, but may not submit the same work to both the Doctoral Consortium and the Student Research Competition.
Note: Student work that is complete, or near to completion, should be submitted as either a technical paper or a poster.
Relevant Topics
Relevant topics for the Consortium are the same as for the conference as a whole. See the Call for Papers.
How to Apply
Each Doctoral Consortium application must contain the following materials:
1. Cover Letter
The cover letter should contain the following information:
2. Project Summary
The Research Summary must be two pages long in the ACM conference format including: title, author information, abstract, keywords, thesis research summary, and references. This extended abstract must clearly address:
3. Letter of Recommendation
A letter from the primary thesis advisor/supervisor that briefly states what the advisor/supervisor expects the student to gain from, and contribute to the consortium.
4. The Candidate's CV
The candidate is required to submit a CV (maximum of 2 pages) that relates her/his background, relevant experience, and research accomplishments.
Submission Format
The Cover Letter, the Project Summary, the Letter of recommendation, and the candidate's CV should be sent to the Doctoral Consortium Chairs via email as separate PDF documents by Midnight HAST (GMT-10:00) on 27 June, 2014. Note that submissions are not double blind submissions; the applicant's name must appear on the documents.
Student Participant Selection Process
The Doctoral Consortium applications will be evaluated based on the following criteria:
In selecting participants the committee may also consider balance in geographic areas and topics covered.
Publication
Following the Doctoral Consortium, the participants may be invited to submit revised and updated papers for publication in a 2015 issue of the SIGACCESS Newsletter.
Sign Language Interpreting or Captioning
Upon request, Sign Language interpreting or captioning will be provided for the Doctoral Consortium, and all other ASSETS events. Requests for an interpreter or captioner must be indicated on the conference registration form when registering for ASSETS 2014.
Important Dates
Travel and Hotel Expenses
Upon acceptance some expenses will be funded such as conference registration, one night hotel (double occupancy) and some travel expenses (up to $500 for US students and up to $900 for international students). Food will be provided for lunch and dinner during the consortium.