AI-Ed 2007 Doctoral Consortium

The doctoral consortium of AI-Ed is intended to allow advanced doctoral students working on AIED related dissertations to present their research and receive feedback from senior scholars in the field as well as other AIED doctoral candidates. Advanced doctoral students include those who: (1) have completed a Master's degree in an AIED-related field, (2) have undertaken a major interdisciplinary project, and/or (3) have about a year of academic work to complete prior to defending their dissertation proposal. This experience should complement the feedback students receive at their home institutions. Accordingly, students applying to participate should be working on a doctoral thesis, but should not be in a stage so close to completion that feedback during the AIED conference would be irrelevant. Examples of appropriate stages of work would include the periods of time immediately prior to or soon after completing one's proposal meeting.

Students selected for the doctoral consortium are invited to participate in workshops and tutorials prior to the conference (i.e., July 9-10). The doctoral consortium will officially take place on July 11-13, 2007 during the three days of the conference that follow the pre-conference workshops and tutorials. The program format dedicated to the students will include three 1.5 hour structured poster sessions (see below for details). The sessions will be open to all conference participants but typically includes a medium-sized audience comprised of AIED conference attendees. Students will be paired-up with a senior member of the AIED society who will serve as a mentor during the conference. Each student will be assigned a mentor based on several criteria, including: (1) proposed mentor identified in the application, (2) availability of participating mentors, and (3) gender preferences. Each student will be assigned a roommate (to save hotel costs) and to foster interactions between future AIED scholars. We expect to provide financial support to doctoral consortium participants by awarding 20 advanced doctoral students with $1,000 each. The financial support is provided by the National Science Foundation (pending funding approval, which is highly expected). The $1000 stipend will go towards travel and hotel accommodations, conference registration, and AIED Society membership (and web access to the journal).

The Application Process:

The deadline for applications is May 14, 2007. Applicants should submit three documents:

1. A two-page summary of the thesis research, including theoretical framework, proposed methods and plans, and contributions to the AIED field. This summary should follow the AIED proceedings formatting guidelines (http://www.isi.edu/AIED2007/submission.html). The summaries for all accepted proposals will be published in a separate conference proceedings and will be made available on-line through the conference website.

2. A half-page statement describing how the doctoral consortium can be of help to the applicant, with reference to where the student expects to be in the dissertation process. For instance, how will the consortium provide feedback on conceptual framework, data analysis, writing, and so on? Applicants also need to include (1) a list 2-3 senior AIED researchers who would ideally play the mentor role during the doctoral consortium, and (2) whether the applicant has any preferences regarding the profile of the assigned mentor, such as international experience or area of interest, e.g., cognitive science, AI, educational psychology, biomedical informatics, language learning, industrial and military applications, etc.

3. A current curriculum vita.

These three documents should be submitted by May 14 to: razevedo@memphis.edu. All inquiries should be directed to this email address as well.

Selection Criteria:

In selecting participants for the consortium, the committee will consider the quality and broad interest of the applicants' research, but will also strive to select a set of studies and projects representing a diversity of institutions, topics, disciplines, ethnicities, and nationalities. Accepted applicants will be asked to submit a revised proposal to the committee on approximately June 15, 2007.

Decisions and notifications will be made by May 28, 2007.

The 2007 AIED Doctoral Consortium Committee includes:
Roger Azevedo (University of Memphis), Arthur C. Graesser (University of Memphis), and Jim Greer (University of Saskatchewan)

Structured Poster Session:

This format blends the presentation and discussion of a paper session or symposium with the individual focus of a poster fair. Each structured poster session will last 90 minutes during which a senior member of the AIED community will introduce the session. In structured poster sessions, authors present abbreviated versions of their papers, followed by comments/critique by a discussant and an audience discussion. A typical structure for a session with 6-8 posters is approximately 5 minutes for the chair's introduction to the session, 5 minutes (per author) for a brief oral presentation, 30 minutes for interaction with audience members, and 15 minutes of discussion from senior AIED member(s) and audience.