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Program Chairs

Stewards of the scholarly and practitioner programs.

Building a robust culture of Program Chairs, with unique privileges, internal awards, and positive engagement is key to organizing each conference - and the longterm health of our network! 

This page orients Program Chairs to responsibilities, timelines, and ready-to-use tools for assembling the academic and iLEAD practitioner streams—across both the face-to-face and online components.

🎯 Scope & Streams

Program Chairs (Academic Stream):
Full/Short Papers • Work-in-Progress (Posters) • Doctoral Consortium • Extended Abstracts • Special Track Proposals • Academic Workshops

Program Chairs (iLEAD Practitioner Stream):
Oral Presentations • Practitioner Posters • Practitioner Workshops • Panels • Special Sessions • Product Demonstrations

Term & Composition: 2-year appointment (Year 1 apprentice → Year 2 lead). Ideally co-chairs from two different continents to ensure global balance.

✅ Responsibilities at a Glance (Checklist)

  • CfP & Reminders: Create, publish, and circulate the Call for Proposals; send deadline reminders.

  • Systems: Configure/operate submission & reviewing platforms (may differ per stream).

  • Committees: Recruit and brief Program Committee (lead reviewers) for each stream.

  • Review Quality: Provide reviewer instructions/forms; monitor quality and timeliness.

  • Ethics & Anonymity: Run plagiarism checks; ensure double-blind compliance.

  • Assignments: Allocate reviewers; re-assign as needed; chase missing reviews.

  • Decisions: Make accept/decline decisions; communicate outcomes to authors.

  • Camera-Ready & Training: Provide instructions; coordinate presenter training & registration info.

  • Program Build: Construct and balance the in-person and online programs (tracks, sessions, timing).

  • Thematic Fit: Vet Special Tracks, workshops, panels, and special sessions for theme alignment.

  • Awards: Nominate top contributions and best reviewers; coordinate awards review.

  • Liaison & Comms: Answer author queries for your stream; coordinate with other chairs.

  • Ceremonies: Contribute to Opening & Closing ceremonies content.

🗓️ Timeline & Countdown (Two-Round Model)

Central Timeline (link placeholder): Program Timeline & Countdown

Round 1 (Academic + iLEAD):

  1. Set up submission system → 2) Invite Program Committee → 3) Author reminder → 4) Finalize reviewer list & review form → 5) Announce deadline extension (if any) → 6) Check anonymity & plagiarism → 7) Allocate reviewers → 8) Remind missing reviews → 9) Allocate additional reviewers → 10) Decisions → 11) Notifications

Round 2 (if used):
Repeat steps: reminder → extend (if any) → checks → allocations → chase reviews → decisions → notifications

Post-Decision:

  • Draft program (online & F2F)

  • Nominate papers & reviewers for awards

  • Issue camera-ready + presenter training requirements

  • Coordinate with Registration & Proceedings/Publication teams

🛠️ Working Toolkit (MVP)

Tip: Keep all templates short, with bolded fields to personalize. Make “copy-and-send” the default.

🤝 Coordination Map

  • General Chairs: CfP confirmation; major milestones; program final sign-off; keynotes/featured alignment.

  • Proceedings/Publication Chair: Camera-ready specs, metadata, rights, proceedings pipeline.

  • Registration/Finance: Author registration windows; policy edge cases (multi-paper authors, waivers).

  • Local Hosts: Room capacities, AV/site constraints, session clustering, on-site flow.

  • Virtual Campus Team: Online session design, moderation, tech checks, recording policy, hybrid etiquette.

  • Special Tracks Leads: Track coherence, review alignment, presenter guidance.

  • Publicity/Strategic Comms: Timely announcements (deadlines, acceptances, program release, awards).

  • Awards Chair: Final award decisions & ceremony segments.

🧭 Decision & Escalation Paths

  • Late/Missing Reviews: 1) Nudge reviewer → 2) Reassign to backup → 3) Flag to Program Chair lead.

  • Authorship/Anonymity Issues: Notify authors with template; require corrected files; if unresolved, escalate to Program Chairs + General Chairs.

  • Theme Misalignment (Tracks/Workshops/Panels): Return with guidance or redirect to appropriate stream; escalate only if contested.

  • Conflicts of Interest: Use system COI flags; reassign to neutral reviewers; record decisions in log.

📈 Quality & Equity Guardrails

  • Balanced Reviewer Load: cap per reviewer; track average turnaround; rotate tricky assignments.

  • Geographic & Modal Balance: ensure representation across continents; balance F2F/online slots.

  • Constructive Declines: every rejection includes 2–3 actionable points.

  • Accessibility: slides & videos follow accessibility checklist; ensure captioning plan for online.

🧩 MVP vs. Nice-to-Have

MVP (seed these before inviting broad co-creation):

  • CfP (one page per stream)

    • 10 regular tracks
    • 7 special tracks

  • Submission system live + reviewer forms loaded

  • Reviewer invitation email & review “how-to” 1-pager

  • Double-blind & plagiarism check procedures

  • Decision letter templates (accept/conditional/reject)

  • Camera-ready instructions

  • Session Builder sheet + timezone guide

  • Awards nomination criteria template

Nice-to-Have (volunteer-friendly additions):

  • Sample annotated reviews and calibration rubric

  • Program visualization (map of themes/tracks)

  • Presenter coaching mini-workshops (deck + recording)

  • “How we built the program” transparency note for attendees

  • Post-conference debrief forms and dataset for meta-analysis

💬 Tone, Expectations, and Time-Saving Norms

  • Two-minute rule: Every task page includes a template and the minimum steps.

  • One page per decision: If it requires judgment, give a short rubric.

  • Automate reminders: Use scheduled nudges inside the submission system wherever possible.

  • Default to clarity: Short, dated updates beat long threads.



The iLRN 2026 Organizing Committee Handbook role description: 

The Program Chair/s are responsible for developing and assembling the scholarly and practitioner portions of the main conference program, respectively.

The Program Chairs are split in two main categories:

  • Program Chairs (Academic Stream) responsible for (f2f and online conf.):

    • Full & short papers

    • Work-in-progress papers (Academic Posters)

    • Doctoral Consortia

    • Extended Abstracts

    • Special Track proposals

    • Academic workshop proposals

    • Guided Virtual Adventures (online PG)

  • Program Chairs (iLEAD Practitioner Stream) responsible for:

    • Oral presentations

    • Practitioner Posters

    • Practitioner workshop proposals

    • Panel session proposals

    • Special sessions proposals

    • Product Demonstrations

From the iLRN2026 Organizing Committee Handbook,
The Program Chairs have the following responsibilities:

  • Create and disseminate the call for proposals (CfP) and send reminders to authors for upcoming deadlines

  • Manage the submission and reviewing software for the review process of the submissions (this may differ for the academic and the practitioner streams as charges apply)

  • Recruit program committee (lead reviewers) for the academic and the practitioner stream accordingly

  • Create instructions and forms for reviewers and review process diagrams for the academic and the practitioner stream accordingly

  • Complete plagiarism checks on all academic papers

  • Ensure that all papers are ready for double-blinded reviews according to website instructions (download and check all submissions, communicate with authors to submit anonymous contributions)

  • Assign reviewers to all submissions academic and the practitioner stream accordingly

  • Oversee the review process and communicate with reviewers and authors accordingly

  • Make decisions on the accepted contributions and communicate the decision to authors

  • Organize and schedule the conference program (in-person and online program groups will organize their respective programs)

  • Review submissions for special track proposals to ensure that they fall in the conference theme

  • Review proposals for workshops, panels and special sessions to ensure that they fall in the conference theme

  • Nominate 3 best contributions in each submitted category based on review scores and comments, and co-ordinate the review process of best contribution awards (academic and the practitioner stream accordingly, 1 in each category, e.g. 1 Best Full paper, 1 best poster etc.)

  • Evaluate quality of reviews, nominate 3 best reviewers for each of the submitted category and co-ordinate the evaluation process of best reviewer in each category (1 in each category, e.g. 1 Best Full papers reviewer, 1 best Posters reviewer)

  • After decision on contributions are made, Program chairs are responsible for communicating with presenters what is required for the preparation of camera ready submissions, preparation of presentations, registration and disseminate information about training for presentations

  • Communicate with authors for any questions related to the academic stream.

  • Contribute to the presentation of the opening and closing ceremonies of the conference.

The Program Chairs role is appointed for serving for a 2-year term. The first year in an apprentice role to a more experienced PC.

Program Chairs ideally should originate from institutions in two different continents.

Tasks (in chronological order):

  1. Set up submission system

  2. Invite program committee (reviewers)

  3. Remind authors of upcoming deadline

  4. Finalise reviewers list and review form 

  5. Announce submission deadline extension

  6. Check for papers anonymity and plagiarism

  7. Allocate reviewers

  8. Send reminders for missing reviews

  9. Allocate additional reviewers if needed

  10. Make acceptance decisions

  11. Send notifications to authors

  12. Remind authors of upcoming deadline (2nd round)

  13. Announce submission deadline extension (2nd round)

  14. Check for papers anonymity and plagiarism (2nd round)

  15. Allocate reviewers (2nd round)

  16. Send reminders for missing reviews (2nd round)

  17. Allocate additional reviewers if needed (2nd round)

  18. Make acceptance decisions (2nd round)

  19. Send notifications to authors (2nd round)

  20. Draft program for online and face-to-face conferences

  21. Nominate papers and reviewers for award committee

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