Panels

Quick Facts

CHI 2024 will be a hybrid conference from May 11-16, 2024 in Honolulu, Hawaii, USA.

Important Dates

All times are in Anywhere on Earth (AoE) time zone. When the deadline is day D, the last time to submit is when D ends AoE. Check your local time in AoE.

• Submission deadline: Thursday, December 14th, 2023
• Notification deadline: Thursday, February 1st, 2024
• e-rights completion deadline: Thursday, February 8th, 2024
• Publication-ready deadline: Thursday, February 29th, 2024
• TAPS Closes: Thursday, March 7th, 2024

Submission Details

• Online submission: PCS Submission System
• Template: ACM Master Article Submission Templates (single column)

Submission Format

• Submission format: maximum 7-page proposal (excluding references)
• Submissions are not anonymous and should include all author names, affiliations, and contact information.

Selection Process

Reviewed

Message from the Panels Chairs

Panels are an interactive, discussion oriented forum in which audience members are participants in the discussion. Organizers are strongly encouraged to propose topics likely to be of broad interest in the CHI community and interactive sessions that will engage both the panelists and the audience in creative ways. Panels should not be a series of short talks, akin to a paper session.

Panels differ from papers in that panels do not need to contain original research. They differ from other venues like demonstrations in that they do not need to present a system or service. Panels are distinctive in their focus on: 1) discussing topics of interest to the CHI community; 2) focusing on audience interaction with the panelists.

Example Topics

A key feature of panels is the importance of the issue in our community. The following list names a few examples that may be exciting for CHI 2024:

• Lessons Learned from Covid-19’s Impact on HCI Research, Practice, and Community
• Race, Gender, Class, Disability, Culture, and Intersectionality in HCI
• Participatory Design and Community-Based Participatory Research Methods
• Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality / Extended Reality Futures
• Researcher Positionality in HCI Research and CHI Papers
• Ethical and Value-Based approaches to HCI Research and Design
• HCI and AI: Connections, Challenges, and Next Steps
• Bridging Academia and Industry in HCI and UX
• Commoning, Community-led and bottom-up Initiatives
• Global Challenges and North – South Collaborations
• HCI in the face of Climate Crisis
• Work Life Balance for HCI Researchers

A Note on Terminology

• Organizer: Coordinates and organizes the panel and the submission and invites moderators and panelists. Can also be a moderator or a panelist.
• Moderator: Moderates the panel. Might also be an organizer, but not necessarily.
• Panelist: Speaks/discusses on the panel. Might also be an organizer, but not necessarily.
• Author: Everyone listed on the submission, including all moderators and panelists (each of whom may also be an organizer).
• Note: All organizers, moderators, and panelists invited to speak/present at the session are responsible for registering for the conference and paying their conference registration fees.

Panel Format

For CHI 2024, panels can be either hybrid (held in-person with ability for panelists and attendees to participate virtually) or fully virtual. In previous conferences, highly successful panels had the following characteristics:

• The presence of a strong moderator who was able to facilitate, help people express their opinions as well as limit off-topic discussions.
• Frame the discussion as a debate with a clear question.
• Pick panelists with naturally opposing viewpoints, positions and backgrounds.
• Ensure that panelists are prepped and debriefed for the session.
• Have clear strategies for involving the audience in discussions.

Effective panels have been designed in many forms and formats. For example, a panel session may include a group of experts who debate a topic or theme, enact some aspect of their expertise, or reflect on and compare their diverse experiences. Panels must include involvement from the audience – such as through questions and answers, voting or critique of the experts’ presentations, discussion, using web-based or mobile technologies, use of the physical room, or other mechanisms – and your proposal should clearly explain how you would involve the audience and encourage interactivity. Panels can take the form of a traditional panel of discussants with a moderator, a fireside chat in which an individual gets interviewed by a moderator, a roundtable in which the moderator(s) pose questions to the audience for discussion, a town hall session, or another proposed format. While we encourage discussions that provide multiple perspectives and controversy, rancor or ad hominem attacks are not professional and must be avoided.

We highly encourage panel organizers to minimize the number of panelists to provide for fruitful and cohesive discussion. The best panels tend to have fewer panelists and more interaction with the audience. We also encourage debate and discussion; we will not accept panels where time is primarily allocated to pre-prepared presentations by panel members.

It is important to us that panels represent the diversity of CHI’s community, including diversity of gender, experience, geographic location, national origin, native language, race, ethnicity, age and sexual identity. For example, panels that have all representatives from one part of the globe or one gender or race may be less favorably considered. Additionally, a diversity of ideas is strongly encouraged. Panels can cover issues of pragmatic or applied importance in addition to research issues. Panels are a great place to sound some of the major debates of the field, whether about how we develop scholarly knowledge or teach and apply that knowledge.

Preparing and Submitting Your Panel

A maximum 7-page proposal (excluding references) in the ACM Master Article Submission Templates (single column) submitted as a single PDF file. In the LaTeX format, use \documentclass[manuscript]{acmart}. Use of different templates or formats may result in desk reject.

The panel proposal should include:

• The panel’s title.
• The names and affiliations of 1-3 organizers/moderators and up to 5 additional panelists.
  • You may also list panelists who have been invited, but have not yet confirmed. Nonetheless, we encourage organizers to get confirmation from as many panelists as possible prior to submission.
  • All panelists must be confirmed at the time of publication ready source files submission, with no exceptions. All panelists must be listed as authors in the proposal and in the PCS Submission System for scheduling reasons, and all authors must be panelists or panel moderator(s), with no exceptions.
  • You must list why these moderators and panelists were selected, and what qualifications they bring.
  • We recommend a maximum of 1-3 organizers/moderators and 5 additional panelists. If a panel requires more than 5 panelists (e.g., to contribute to CHI’s inclusion and equity goals), the proposal must provide rationale.
• A summary of the main topic(s) to be presented, debated, discussed, enacted; any lessons or experiences you hope to convey in the session; as well as contrasting or controversial perspectives on the topic(s).
• A description of the proposed panel’s format (hybrid of fully virtual), and how the panel organizers will ensure discussion and interactivity in a hybrid or virtual format. Describe how you will run the panel, the organizers’/panelists’/moderators’ roles, and any special logistical needs (e.g., special seating or A/V, audience size limitations, involvement of student volunteers, accessibility requirements, language-support requests, etc.).
• Regardless of the topic, all panel proposals must include a plan for interactivity and engaging audience members.
• You need to persuade the chairs that your panel will be exciting, enjoyable, well-attended, and relevant to the CHI community.

Your proposal must stand alone; readers must be able to get something out of the proposal even if they do not attend the panel session.

Submissions should not contain sensitive, private, or proprietary information that cannot be disclosed at publication time. Submissions should NOT be anonymous. However, confidentiality of submissions will be maintained during the review process. All rejected submissions will be kept confidential. All submitted materials for accepted submissions will be kept confidential until the start of the conference, with the exception of title and author information which will be published on the website prior to the conference.

Metadata Integrity

All submission metadata, including required fields in PCS like author names, affiliations, and order, must be complete and correct by the submission deadline.  This information is crucial to the integrity of the review process and author representation.  No changes to metadata after this deadline will be allowed.

Accessibility

Authors are strongly encouraged to work on improving the accessibility of their submissions before peer review begins, using recommendations found in the Guide to an Accessible Submission for their paper and in the technical requirements for video content for their video. For any questions or concerns about creating accessible submissions, please contact the Accessibility Chairs at accessibility@chi2024.acm.org.

Selection Process

Panels will have a mix of invited and curated content. All proposals submitted through this open call will be at the level of prepublication evaluation reviewed. We will determine which panels are accepted on the basis of the review criteria below, and may decide to bring in outside experts for further review. There is no mechanism for author response in the panel review process, and decisions are final. In some special cases, the Panels Chairs may request changes to the panel proposal as a condition of its acceptance (“conditional accept”). We encourage panel organizers to respond rapidly to suggestions from the Panels Chairs as part of the “conditional accept” and to engage in constructive dialog to produce the best overall panel experience for the conference.

Authors of accepted panels will receive instructions on how to prepare and submit the publication ready source files for their panel. These will be due on the publication-ready deadline.

Review Criteria

Panels present ideas that are novel, controversial, or engaging, and that inspire the audience to respond and further elaborate. We aim to select a balance of panels to appeal to the wide variety of CHI attendees. The review criteria will consider the extent to which the session includes:

• One or more topics likely to evoke a lively response from the CHI attendees.
• Invited panelists who will contribute unique perspectives, content, or other interactive content to the session.
• A well-organized and feasible session plan, particularly for a hybrid or fully virtual format.
• A novel and creative session plan that emphasizes audience interaction.
• Useful and interesting contributions to HCI.
• Appropriate levels of diversity in panelist selection (e.g., diversity of ideas but also characteristics like gender, experience, geographic location, national origin, native language, race, ethnicity, age, etc.).
• Likely to draw a large audience.
• Content that is unlikely to be seen by CHI audiences elsewhere in the conference.

Upon Acceptance of Your Submission

The corresponding author of a conditionally accepted paper has to follow the instructions on preparing and submitting a final version by the publication-ready deadline. If the authors cannot meet these requirements by the publication-ready deadline, the venue chairs will be notified and may be required to remove the paper from the program. The publication-ready version has to follow the LaTeX and Word templates from ACM. Should you need technical assistance, please direct your technical query to: publications@chi2024.acm.org.

At the Conference

Panels will be included in the conference program, and will have allocated session in parallel with other sessions. Panel organizers are strongly advised to meet with their invited panelists prior to their session to ensure a coordinated effort. If any special logistics are involved (e.g., seating, student volunteers, unique technological setup), organizers should alert the Panels Chairs (panels@chi2024.acm.org).

Panel organizers are also reminded that panelists invited to speak/present at the session are responsible for their conference registration fees. There are one day registrations available for panelists who do not wish to attend the entire conference. As a reference point, CHI 2023 had the following registration fees available:

• Early registration fee for full conference at $952 (ACM Member) / $1,190 (Non-Member)
• Early registration fee for virtual conference at  $309 (ACM Member) / $428 (Non-Member)
• One-day registration fee at $387 (ACM Member) / $476 (Non-Member)

(We would expect fees to increase nominally for CHI 2024)

After the Conference

Panels can often be a jumping-off point for future work. Previous panels have become the starting point for special issues of journals or books, or follow-up panels, papers, workshops, SIG meetings or Communities. We encourage panel organizers to think about their panel’s potential to inform future work or public audiences. Accepted panel abstracts will be distributed in the CHI Conference Extended Abstracts and in the ACM Digital Library, where they will remain accessible to thousands of researchers and practitioners worldwide.