Student Research Competition: CHI 2009 Call for Participation

Quick Facts

Submission: 7 January 2009
Notification: 30 January 2009
Camera Ready: 4 February 2009
Submission Format: Camera-ready unanonymized 6 page extended abstract in Extended Abstracts format, plus proof of student status.
At the Conference: Poster and possibly a Short Talk
Archives: Extended abstracts; DVD and ACM Digital Library

Message from the Student Research Competition Chairs

The Student Research Competition (SRC) is a forum for undergraduates and graduate students to share their research results, exchange ideas, and improve their communication skills while competing for prizes at CHI 2009. Sponsored by Microsoft Research, the CHI SRC competition is a branch of the ACM Student Research Competition which hosts similar competitions at other ACM conferences in other areas of computer science. Students accepted to participate in the Student Research Competition at CHI 2009 are entitled to a travel grant to help cover travel expenses, up to a maximum of US $500. Students must be members of ACM to qualify for travel funding and awards.

The Student Research Competition has the following goals:

to give undergraduate and graduate students the opportunity to share their research ideas and results at CHI in a special forum that provides visibility for their work
to give students the opportunity to meet with and interact with CHI attendees to share ideas, gain new insights, and understand possible practical applications
to give students an opportunity to sharpen their communication skills, including visual, organizational, oral, and aural modalities
to provide detailed feedback to students about their research and presentation, from a panel of distinguished judges from industry and academia
to recognize and reward outstanding students

Although ACM and CHI both recognize the importance of collaborative research, the Student Research Competition is meant to be an opportunity for junior students to develop their skills as researchers and to give them an opportunity to showcase their work. One of the goals of the program is to focus on the student, their capabilities as a researcher, and their potential. As such, only individual research projects will be considered for the Student Research Competition.

The top three winners at CHI 2009 in each category (undergraduate and graduate) will receive prizes of US $500, US $300, and US $200, respectively. All winners also receive an award certificate and two-year complimentary ACM membership with a subscription to ACM's Digital Library. Winners will be recognized during the closing plenary session of the CHI 2009 conference. These winners will also go on to compete in the ACM grand finals with winners from other ACM conferences.

Rob Miller, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Joanna McGrenere
Contact us: studentresearch@chi2009.org

What is a Student Research Competition Submission?

A submission to the Student Research Competition should describe recently completed or ongoing individual student research (possibly under the supervision of an advisor), in any of the topic areas covered by CHI. Submissions should be original work that is neither in submission nor already published in CHI or another conference or journal.

Student Research Competition submissions will be simultaneously considered for the Work in Progress track, and students not accepted to participate in the Student Research Competition will be considered for the Work in Progress track.

The Student Research Competition is not an archival publication that constrains future submissions. Your abstract and poster are not considered to be a prior publication of the work for the purposes of a future CHI Paper or CHI Note or for a journal publication.

Participants must be undergraduates or graduate students pursuing an academic degree at the time of initial submission. The contest has two categories, one for undergraduate research and the other for graduate research. Three winners will be selected in each category. Research completed while the student was an undergraduate may be submitted to the undergraduate category even if the student is now a first-year graduate student. Participants must provide a signed letter from their academic supervisor confirming that they are registered as a full-time student and that at least 50% of their working week is spent following an academic course of study.

Preparing and Submitting your Student Research Competition Proposal

Students should submit a camera-ready unanonymized short paper (6 pages maximum) written in the Extended Abstracts format. The student competing in the research competition must be the primary contributor of the work and must be the first author on the paper. Supervisors of the work may be listed as co-authors on the CHI 2009 publication however, all authors should be aware that winners who go on to the ACM Grand Finals will be required to submit a single-authored version of their paper for that competition.

Papers should describe:

Research problem and motivation
Background and related work
Approach and uniqueness
Results and contributions

Student Research Competition submissions should be submitted to the Work-In-Progress category of CHI 2009 via the conference submission system. Final submission PDFs must be no larger than 4 megabytes. This must be received by 7 January 2009. The Work-in-Progress submission page includes a check-box where students can indicate that they would like to be considered for the Student Research Competition.

All submissions must be accompanied by a Proof of Student Status indicating (1) the student's university; (2) the student's ACM member number; (3) whether the student was a graduate or undergraduate when the work was done, and (4) confirming that the student is currently enrolled in an academic program full-time. This proof should be signed by the student's academic supervisor.

Student Research Competition Review Process

Submissions will be reviewed by a panel of experts, and evaluated based on

Quality of work
Novelty of approach
Significance of the contribution to the field of HCI
Clarity of written presentation

Up to twenty-five students (15 undergraduate and 10 graduate) will be chosen to participate in the competition at CHI 2009.

Confidentiality of submissions is maintained during the review process. All rejected submissions will be kept confidential in perpetuity. 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.

Upon Acceptance of Your Student Research Competition Abstract

Students accepted to the competition are entitled to a travel grant covering expenses for travel to CHI, including conference registration, transportation, lodging, and meals, up to a limit of US $500. Students must be members of ACM to qualify for these awards.

At the Conference

The first round of the competition evaluates the research during a poster presentation at CHI. The presentation will be evaluated on two axes, given equal weight: (1) the presentation of the research, both visual aspects of the poster and the student's oral discussion, and (2) the research, specifically its quality, novelty, and significance of the contribution.

Poster must fit on a panel 36" wide by 48" tall, printed portrait style.

Based on the results from the poster session, the judges will select students to advance to the second round. During the second round, students will have the opportunity give a short presentation of their research (10 minutes) followed by a question and answer period (5 minutes) which will be evaluated by a panel of judges.

The top three winners in each category (undergraduate and graduate) as determined by the judges' evaluation of the conference presentations, will receive prizes of US $500, US $300, and US $200, respectively. Winners will be announced during the closing plenary.

Competition Judges

Michael Muller
Elizabeth Churchill
Robin Jeffries
Ivan Poupyrev
Lorrie Cranor
Andrew Monk
Michael Terry
Per Ola Kristensson
Ben Bederson
Sharon Oviatt
Andy Cockburn
Gilbert Cockton
Simeon Keates
Susanne Bødker
Paul Maglio
Melanie Kellar
Robert Kraut
Terry Winograd
Jeremy Birnholtz
John Canny

After the Conference

The winners from each category will advance to ACM Grand Finals of the Student Research Competition where the winners of several ACM conferences compete for more prizes and recognition.

Accepted Student Research Competition Papers will be distributed in the CHI Conference Extended Abstracts DVD. They will also be placed in the ACM Digital Library, where they will remain accessible to thousands of researchers and practitioners worldwide.