Guidelines for Hosting the IJCNLP Conference

Procedure for selecting the local organizer

1. The decision for selecting the local organizer to host the next IJCNLP conference will be made in the preceding AFNLP-CCC official meeting (which is usually held two years ahead of the next IJCNLP conference). We will call this meeting as "Local Organizer Selection Meeting" from now on.

2. Those who are interested in hosting the next IJCNLP conference (called "candidates" from now on) should express their intention to the AFNLP-CCC chair before the Local Organizer Selection Meeting (so that their presentation could be put into the agenda in advance).

3. Each candidate should present his/her proposal at the Local Organizer Selection Meeting (each one is allocated with 15 minutes, usually). The proposal should at least cover following items: the proposed budget plan, the conference venue/facility/period, local environment (including international traveling information, interesting points, etc), and social events (welcome reception, dinner, etc).

4. Afterwards, the attendants of AFNLP-CCC members will vote and decide who will host the next IJCNLP conference. The decision will be announced during the conference period, and the local organizer will be arranged to make brief introduction and deliver the welcome message at the conference closing session.

Procedure for selecting other IJCNLP Conference organizers

1. AFNLP-CCC will appoint one conference chair and two program chairs for each IJCNLP conference. Other conference organizers (e.g., tutorial chair(s), workshop chair(s), publication chair(s), publicity chair(s), Demo/Exhibition chair(s), etc) will be decided by the conference chair after he/she has been appointed. Also, the honorary chair is optional and will be decided by the AFNLP steering committee (this position is usually suggested by the local organizer, who might need that title to get more local support, or the AFNLP steering committee might want to use that title for some purposes).

2. The AFNLP-CCC chair should conduct the selection process (for the conference chair and the program chairs) at least one and a half years before the conference date.

3. The AFNLP-CCC chair should first list the factors (e.g., balance, etc) that should be taken into consideration, and then solicit candidates from AFNLP-CCC members. The AFNLP-CCC chair might also add at most two additional candidates to each candidates list (one list for conference chair candidates, and one list for program chairs candidates).

4. The AFNLP-CCC members will then vote the conference chair and the program chairs from the given candidates lists (via email communication). To avoid embarrassing candidates, the AFNLP-CCC chair should only announce the top-3 candidates (without associated votes) for each category, and then invite them according to that order. The selection process should start again if all those top-3 candidates are not able to accept our invitation.

5. AFNLP-CCC should formally appoint the conference chair and the program chairs at least one year and three months before the conference date. The conference chair should appoint other committee chairs (e.g., tutorial chair(s), workshop chair(s), publication chair(s), publicity chair(s), etc) within three months after he/she has been appointed.

Conference Supervising Committee and International Advisory Committe

1. To help supervising and promoting the conference, we will have a Conference Supervising Committee and an optional International Advisory Committee. The Conference Supervising Committee will be appointed by the AFNLP-CCC, and the International Advisory Committee (which mainly gives advices and suggests directions) will be appointed by the AFNLP Steering Committee.

2. The conference supervising committee is responsible for monitoring and supervising the conference. It will approve the conference budget plan and the final balance sheet. The local organizer and various conference organizers will report to this conference supervising committee about the progress for organizing the conference. Therefore, those AFNLP-CCC members who serve as the local organizer and other conference organizers should be excluded from this conference supervising committee.

3. The AFNLP-CCC members will automatically become the members of conference supervising committee (unless he/she explicitly refuses to be listed). The AFNLP-CCC chair will also be the chair for the conference supervising committee, and could nominate a few additional committee members (usually for involving some influential peoples to further promote the conference). Those additional committee members should be approved by the AFNLP-CCC members, and their number should not exceed one third of the AFNLP-CCC members.

Duties for various conference organizers

1. The program chairs are only responsible for the main conference technical program (not including tutorials, workshops and other non-technical events). They should organize program committee, review/select papers and decide main conference invited speakers.

2. The conference chair is responsible for appointing other committee chairs (e.g., tutorial chair(s), workshop chair(s), publication chair(s), publicity chair(s), Demo/Exhibition chair(s), etc). He/She should coordinate the local organizer, the program chairs, and other committee chairs that he/she appoints to make the conference to be smoothly conducted.

3. The local organizer, the conference chair and the program chairs should make a conference plan to the supervising committee. This plan mainly includes the schedule of milestones for various conference major events (e.g., set up web-site, start paper submission, announce paper acceptance, start registration, print Proceedings, etc). The local organizer, the conference chair and the program chairs should report the progress to the supervising committee according to the given conference plan.

4. The local organizer should close the final balance sheet of the conference income and expense within three months after the conference. He/She should then report the balance sheet to the supervising committee within two weeks after it has been finalized.

How the possible surplus/deficit be handled

1. AFNLP will set up an account as the reservoir for hosting conferences/activities and for paying other administration expense. The donation that is specified to be given to AFNLP will directly go to that reservoir (not to be included within the conference budget). The donation that is specified to be given to the conference will go to the conference income (covered by the conference budget).

2. The local organizer should get his/her budget plan approved by the AFNLP-CCC first. Afterwards, the AFNLP-CCC and the local organizer will be jointly responsible for the conference balance sheet. The local organizer and the AFNLP-CCC will equally divide the final possible surplus/deficit (the AFNLP-CCC share will be put/extract into/from the AFNLP reservoir mentioned above) generated from the approved conference budget plan. However, for each expense item that exceeds the amount listed in the budget plan and has potential to cause final deficit, it should be first reported and approved by the supervising committee before it can be actually executed. Otherwise, the AFNLP-CCC will not be responsible for the final deficit.

Program Committee Guidelines

1. Each paper should be blindly reviewed by at least three reviewers (if possible).

2. The program chair is expected to keep the similar paper quality as that of previous years.

3. It is suggested to announce the Best Paper Award (if the program committee decide to have it) in the conference closing session to keep peoples to the last minute.

4. It is suggested to ask at least one of the authors of each paper to pre-register the conference for ensuring theirs paper to be included in the Proceedings.