Guidelines for AATSEEL Affiliate Panels

Introduction

This document outlines the guidelines for conference panels sponsored by AATSEEL Affiliate Associations. It is designed to provide AATSEEL Affiliate Associations with control over the makeup of their panels while simultaneously maintaining Program Committee oversight of all conference panels.


Definitions

  1. AATSEEL Affiliate Associations. AATSEEL Affiliate Associations should communicate to AATSEEL's executive director the name of the person who will serve as the Affiliate Association's liaison with the Program Committee. This person must be accessible by phone, fax, and electronic mail, especially during the April and August abstract review periods.
  2. AATSEEL Affiliate Submissions. There will be two types of submissions to panels sponsored by AATSEEL Affiliate Associations: those invited personally by an AATSEEL Affiliate Association and those submitted for an AATSEEL Affiliate Association's panel but not invited personally. These will be treated identically by the Program Committee, and both types are called "AATSEEL Affiliate submissions" in this text. Submissions that are not earmarked by their authors for AATSEEL Affiliate Association panels are not AATSEEL Affiliate submissions, and will be treated like any other regular AATSEEL submissions.

AATSEEL Program Committee Refereeing

All AATSEEL Affiliate submissions, like all other submissions, must pass AATSEEL refereeing. The sole criteria for acceptance by AATSEEL are the published AATSEEL abstract guidelines. As with all other AATSEEL submissions, the Program Committee will send all AATSEEL Affiliate submissions anonymously to at least two referees. The referee reports will be advisory, with the official Program Committee decision made by the appropriate Program Committee representative (who has the authority to override the referees where this is appropriate). In this respect AATSEEL Affiliate submissions are treated identically to all other submissions.


Acceptance of AATSEEL Affiliate Submissions

Unlike with other AATSEEL submissions, acceptance of any AATSEEL Affiliate submission will be communicated by the Program Committee to the AATSEEL Affiliate Association's representative, and not initially to the author of the abstract. The AATSEEL Affiliate Association will then decide (see below for the criteria for this decision) which of the accepted AATSEEL Affiliate submissions to include in its panel, and will communicate this decision to the Program Committee. Accepted AATSEEL Affiliate submissions that the AATSEEL Affiliate Association declines to include in the AATSEEL Affiliate Association's panel will be transformed into accepted regular submissions and placed on other appropriate panels by the Program Committee. In either case, the Program Committee will send an acceptance letter to all authors of accepted submissions, but will do so only after the AATSEEL Affiliate Association has decided which accepted submissions to include in the AATSEEL Affiliate Association's panel.


Rejection of AATSEEL Affiliate Submissions

Unlike with other AATSEEL submissions, rejection of any AATSEEL Affiliate submission will be communicated to the AATSEEL Affiliate Association, and not initially to the author. The AATSEEL Affiliate Association will then decide for each rejected submission whether it is still interested in considering that submission for the AATSEEL Affiliate Association's panel. The AATSEEL Affiliate Association will return to the Program Committee those submissions that the AATSEEL Affiliate Association does not wish to consider further for the AATSEEL Affiliate Association's panel, whereupon those submissions will become regular submissions, and will be handled accordingly by the Program Committee. AATSEEL Affiliate submissions that have been rejected by the regular AATSEEL review process, but that the AATSEEL Affiliate Association would nonetheless like to include in its panel, will be handled as follows:

  1. Appeal of Program Committee Decision. The AATSEEL Affiliate Association's representative may contest any rejection of an AATSEEL Affiliate submission. The final decision about acceptance or rejection will rest with the Program Committee representative, but since both the Program Committee and AATSEEL Affiliate Association will be applying the same criteria (the published AATSEEL abstract guidelines), disagreement that cannot be resolved should be unlikely. If the AATSEEL Affiliate Association's representative persuades the Program Committee representative to accept a particular abstract, it will be treated like any other accepted abstract.
  2. Revision and Resubmission of AATSEEL Affiliate Submissions. If an AATSEEL Affiliate submission must be revised before acceptance by AATSEEL and the AATSEEL Affiliate Association decides that it would like to include that paper in the AATSEEL Affiliate Association's panel, the AATSEEL Affiliate Association may make the required revisions directly, or may arrange for the original author to make them. In either case, the AATSEEL Affiliate Association will be responsible for communicating with the author concerning the status of the submission, and the AATSEEL Affiliate Association will submit a revised version of the abstract in question to the Program Committee representative for reconsideration. Reconsideration need not require additional anonymous refereeing, especially if the deficiencies noted by the initial referees are straightforward and the Program Committee representative feels that they have been resolved, but substantially new submissions will need to undergo the regular review process.

AATSEEL Affiliate Associations Criteria for Acceptance

The AATSEEL Affiliate Association alone determines which accepted AATSEEL Affiliate Association submissions will be included in the AATSEEL Affiliate Association's panel. The AATSEEL Affiliate Association may apply any criteria it considers appropriate to this decision, including the identity of the author. AATSEEL Affiliate submissions that are accepted by AATSEEL but not included by the AATSEEL Affiliate Association in the AATSEEL Affiliate Association's panel will be placed on other appropriate panels by the Program Committee.