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Vol.27 No.4, October 1995
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For the past 10 years, SIGCHI has sponsored a Doctoral Consortium which is held at the annual CHI conference. Traditionally, the Doctoral Consortium has been a closed event in which an invited group of doctoral candidates present their research-in-progress to each other and to a faculty committee. In addition to the presentations, there are typically group exercises and discussion sessions which are designed to allow the Doctoral Consortium participants to get to know one another better, to think about their research in the larger context of the CHI field, and to become more fully integrated citizens of the CHI community. Participants in the Doctoral Consortium also are encouraged to participate in the CHI conference poster event.
The CHI '95 Doctoral Consortium, held May 7-8 in Denver, Colorado, followed the traditional format described above. However, in keeping with the approach of continuous innovation and iterative design which is ingrained in the CHI conference planning process, the students and faculty who participated in this year's event also thought about ways to improve upon that format. The main opportunity we see for the future is to create more of a link between the Doctoral Consortium and the main conference. The sections below will report on both the key events of this year's Doctoral Consortium and on the ideas we have for the future.
A total of 19 doctoral candidates participated in the CHI '95 Doctoral Consortium. These students ranged from being in the initial stages of dissertation research planning to the final stages of dissertation completion. They represented a variety of academic departmental disciplines -- including psychology, education, electrical engineering, and information design -- though computer science was by far the dominant discipline. Geographical representation included various parts of North America and Europe; unfortunately, there were no applicants this year from other regions of the globe.
The presentations of the student participants touched upon a wide range of topics, including (but not limited to): innovative input and output devices and methods; design principles for UI's involving multimedia, large-scale information spaces, and virtual worlds; new tools for UI design; end-user programming; understanding and improving design processes; and designing UI's for learning, collaboration, and other specific applications. The CHI '95 Conference Companion includes a two-page summary of each of the following titles:
The faculty committee for the Doctoral Consortium performs a number of tasks. First, this committee reviews all the applications submitted and selects approximately 15 participants who represent excellent work in various areas of the CHI field and who are likely to both give and receive benefits by participating in the event. The review committee for the CHI '95 Doctoral Consortium consisted of:
During the Doctoral Consortium event, members of the faculty committee chaired the sessions in which the presentations were given. After each presentation, students and faculty alike offered questions, discussion and suggestions pertaining to the presenter's work. Members of the faculty committee also participated in group social activities and served as resources during the planned group events described below.
During the Doctoral Consortium, there were a number of breaks and meals at which the participants had the opportunity to discuss topics of interest with each other and invited guests. To round out the agenda for the Doctoral Consortium, there were two planned group events.
For the first event, various perspectives on CHI career paths were given by members of the faculty committee and by our invited guests, Dr. Jay Elkerton (NYNEX Science and Technology), Professor Clayton Lewis (University of Colorado), and Professor David Novick (Oregon Graduate Institute of Science and Technology). Dr. Elkerton reflected on his transition from academia to industry and spoke of the satisfaction he finds in having a real impact on the design of products, services and systems used by a large number of people. Prof. Lewis talked about how the CHI field is likely to be impacted by changes underway in the structure of work, careers and education. Prof. Novick talked about career management and the need to find the right balance between individual contribution and service to one's institution and professional community. Members of the faculty committee talked about the various choices offered by careers in CHI, stressing the importance of finding work compatible with personal values and discussing strategies for optimizing within constraints.
For the second event, student participants broke out into four teams (with the faculty committee forming a fifth team) to reflect on "What will be the key issues and problems for the CHI field over the next ten years?" At the end of our second day, each team gave a short presentation of their views, taking this as an opportunity for sharing fun and humor as well as serious reflection and insight.
At various points during the Doctoral Consortium we had the chance to talk about the event itself and its value. All were agreed that the event had value for the individual participants. However, we also thought that additional value might be gained, both for the participants and for the CHI community, by creating more of a link between the Doctoral Consortium and the main CHI conference. One way to do this would be to have representatives from the Doctoral Consortium give a report on some aspect of their event at the main conference. While we did not see an opportunity for our group to do this during the CHI '95 conference (since the schedule was already established), it occurred to us that a panel or presentation based on our CHI Ten Year View exercise might be of interest to the CHI '96 conference. Those of you who attend the conference in Vancouver may have the opportunity to help us try out this idea.
Current doctoral candidates interested in participating in the next CHI Doctoral Consortium can obtain further information from the CHI call for participation. An electronic version of this and additional materials useful for preparing a submission are available via the World Wide Web at http://www.acm.org/sigchi/conferences/
Catherine Marshall is the founder of Collaborative Technologies, a start-up company working in the area of multimedia conferencing and distributed groupware. Prior to her new venture, she held the position of Executive Director, Interactive Video and Data at U S WEST. Catherine also has been a Visiting Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the Oregon Graduate Institute and has worked for Hewlett-Packard and AT&T Bell Laboratories.
Catherine Marshall
Collaborative Technologies
395 Del Monte Center,
Ste. 260 Monterey, CA 93940, USA
crm@collabtech.com
Phone: +1-(408) 672-7148
Fax: +1-(408) 645-9406
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Vol.27 No.4, October 1995 |
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