Welcome to UKICER 2020

The United Kingdom and Ireland Computing Education Research (UKICER) conference from the UK ACM Special Interest Group in Computing Science Education is emerging as one of the leading venues nationally and internationally for researchers and practitioners to meet and share advances in computing science education.

The UKICER 2020 theme is gathering ideas together and has been chosen to emphasise that (1) computing science education research comprises of many different areas and ideas, including cyber security and data science, and (2) to celebrate practice that brings people together and makes the most of people in the same space.

We are a diverse and inclusive community bringing together researchers, academics, industry practitioners and teachers from across the United Kingdom and Ireland as well as from the rest of Europe and the wider world.

The conference takes place on Thursday 3rd of September and Friday 4th of September 2020 online

UKICER 2020 going online!

The United Kingdom and Ireland Computing Education Research (UKICER) conference from the UK ACM Special Interest Group in Computing Science Education is going online!

While we will miss meeting physically in person, we looking forward to welcoming many more to our community, both nationally and internationally, with reduced registration fees and interactive online sessions. The approach also allows us to simplify and extend deadline dates and provide more time to authors as booking accommodation and travel are no longer a constraint. The abstract deadline is Friday the 3rd of July 2020 with full papers expected the following week on Friday the 10th of July 2020.

Submissions

Submissions for both research papers, workshop proposals and posters must be made through Easychair. There is an option on the submission form to indicate whether the submission is a research paper or workshop proposal.

Any questions about submissions should be emailed to the General and Programme Chairs: Joseph Maguire (mailto:joseph.maguire@glasgow.ac.uk) and Quintin Cutts (mailto:quintin.cutts@glasgow.ac.uk).

Submission format

Submissions must conform to the ACM proceeding template. The page limit is six pages, not counting the references. The references may occupy a seventh page if the paper reaches the six-page limit.

Authors must make an electronic submission in the form of a PDF file via EasyChair. Authors will need to create an EasyChair account, if they do not have one, and complete a submission form. The submission form requires authors to detail the submission type, title, abstract as well as contact information.

Submissions from authors must be anonymised to support the review process. The initial submission for review must be anonymised, authors must remove all references to them, including affiliations and any identifying information within the body of the submission.

Note that reviewers will assume they are reviewing completed works, as they will eventually appear in the conference proceedings. Do not submit incomplete drafts.

Workshop submissions

Workshop proposals should consist of a max 500 word abstract, which should include: details of the workshop’s content, practical requirements (e.g. group discussion tables, computer room, etc) whether or not this workshop has been run before, and intended take-away knowledge for participants.

Posters submissions

Posters should should be around 250 to 500 words and describe the early or proposed work and contribution of it. Research Posters 101 provides a good starting point for considering the content and overall design of a strong research poster.

Review process and publication

The review process is double-blind with authors required to submit anonymised artefacts. Each submission is reviewed by at least three members of the programme committee. Upon completion of reviews, reviewers enter the discussion stage and are expected to discuss their reviews anonymously, especially when notable differences exist. The programme chair utilises discussions and reviews to determine an appropriate balance of accepted papers.

Conflict of Interest

Authors must ensure their submissions abide by the ACM Conflict of Interest Policy (COI). Reviewers are required by chairs to identify any conflicts of interest prior to being allocated any submissions to review. Authors are expected to inform any conflicts of interest prior or at the point of submission of any artefacts for review.

Proxy chair and expert panel

Submissions that represent a conflict of interest for all conference chairs are passed to the proxy chair. The proxy chair assembles an expert panel of two or more members, the members are not required to be part of the programme committee. The members of the expert panel are not known to the chairs. The proxy chair and expert panel consider the conflicted papers, reviews and any discussion amongst reviewers. The expert panel makes the final decision on the conflicted papers and this is communicated to the conference chairs.

Accepted submissions

If accepted, authors must submit camera-ready source files through the ACM Production System (TAPS). The camera-ready submission must include author details, affiliations and any relevant information previously removed for the purposes of review.

The ACM Production System (TAPS)

The ACM provide Master Articile and Production Workflows in Microsoft Word and LaTeX. The ACM also provide best practice guidance and videos for TAPS.

Fonts

Final camera-ready submissions must have embedded scalable fonts, those submissions that do not will need to be corrected. The ACM have provided documentation to support authors in ensuring their camea-ready submission have embedded scalable fonts.

References

The references may occupy a seventh page if the paper reaches the six-page limit, only references may occupy a seventh page. Authors should ensure that references are balanced (the two columns of references on the final page should be the same length).

Accessibility

SIGACCESS have provided documentation to support authors in ensuring their camea-ready submission is accessible.

Copyright

Authors are expected to review the ACM Copyright policy and ensure the final camera-ready submission complies with the policy and that authors properly documents any third-party material.

ACM e-Rights Transfer Application

Authors are required to complete an electronic ACM e-Rights Transfer Application and include the appropriate ACM Right Statement and bibliographic strip in the camera-ready submission. ACM will contact accepted authors shortly after notification of acceptance with the details. Authors should check SPAM folders for any emails from rightsreview@acm.org.

ACM Computing Classification System (CCS)

The camera-ready submission must also include and display the ACM Computing Classification System (CCS) index terms, as designated by the authors. The interactive ACM CCS tool can be used to generate the appropriate code block.

ACM Support

Authors that have questions or have encountered difficulties with the ACM authoring templates should contact the Aptara support team (acmtexsupport@aptaracorp.com). For specific queries with the conference proceeding publication, authors can contact submissions@ukicer.com.

Author Registration

The final submission will be published in the conference proceedings. At least one author must register for the conference and present the accepted paper for it to appear in the conference proceedings. All accepted submissions must be presented at the conference by a subset of the authors.

Publication of proceedings

The official publication date of the conference proceedings is when they become available via the digital repository. The specific date may be up to 14 days prior to the initial day of the conference. Contributors should be aware of this publication date when considering other artefacts associated with published work, e.g. patent filings.

Previous proceedings

The proceedings from the conference last year are available on the ACM Digital Library

Registration

The registration platform is EventBrite and the conference will be delivered using a range of platforms, including EventBrite. Tickets can be purchased below or directly through the EventBrite platform.

Registration Terms and Conditions

• The registration fee for UKICER 2020 is considerably lower than originally envisioned and lower than the previous conference.
• All registrations are final and no refunds or cancellations permitted, even in the event for failure to participate in the conference.
• The organisers will endeavour to run the conference programme as intended. In circumstances where that is not possible the organisers may alter the conference programme.
• The organisers are not liable for any claims for damages and/or losses if the entire conference has to be canceled due to a force majeure incident.

Sponsors