[ecoop-info] ICST 2011 Ph.D. Symposium: Call for Submissions

[Gordon Fraser]

CALL FOR PHD SYMPOSIUM SUBMISSIONS

Fourth IEEE International Conference on Software Testing, Verification
and Validation (ICST 2011)

Berlin, Germany
March 21 - 25, 2011

http://sites.google.com/site/icst2011/

Goal:
-----
The symposium will be held during the main ICST conference.  The goal
is several-fold: To provide constructive feedback and guidance to
doctoral students who are performing their dissertation research in
the fields of software testing and verification and validation, to
develop a supportive community of researchers and potential
collaborators, and to permit students to interact with established
researchers and practitioners in the field.

Scope:
------
The symposium will serve both "early" post-qualifier PhD researchers
who have some preliminary results as well as ABDs (all but
dissertation students) who have at least another six months before
their dissertation defence. Each paper will present a research
summary, maximum of four pages in the conference style. The first
author of the paper will be the student reporting on his/her
research. Nevertheless, other co-authors (e.g. his/her advisors) are
allowed. We expect all students of accepted papers to give a short
presentation. After the public presentation, the students will receive
oral feedback from a panel of researchers/practitioners. The students
may also seek advice regarding: Completion of a PhD, how to perform
research in testing, how to design and execute empirical research,
etc.

Review Process:
---------------
There will be a screening process based on a short research summary.
The following criteria will be considered:

 - Quality of the research
 - Relevance of the research to software testing, verification and
   validation, 
 - Quality of the summary, diversity of background, research topic,
   and approach, and
 - Stage of the research.

Therefore, the summary should include the following issues:

 - The problem to be addressed by the thesis (justify the importance
   and show that it has not yet been addressed),
 - The research hypothesis,
 - The expected contributions of the dissertation research,
 - The proposed research approach,
 - Summary of results to date, and
 - How you plan to evaluate your results and present these to the community.

Upon notification of acceptance, all authors of accepted research
summaries will be asked to complete a copyright form and will receive
further instructions for preparing their camera ready versions for
publication in the conference proceedings.

Submissions:
------------
Submissions are managed through Easychair, see the ICST website for
details.  The research summary must conform to the ICST 2011 Format
and Submission Guidelines and must be a maximum of four pages with
main text in 10 point font, including all text, references,
appendices, and figures. All submissions must be in English.

In addition to the submission, the student's advisor should email to
the symposium co-chairs (see below) a letter of recommendation. The
letter must include an assessment of the current status of the thesis
research, and the expected date for dissertation submission.

Important Dates:
----------------
October 1, 2010: Deadline for submissions
November 30, 2010: Notification of Acceptance
March 2011: ICST 2011 Doctoral Symposium

Doctoral Symposium Chair:
-------------------------
Gordon Fraser, Saarland University, Germany

Panel Members:
--------------
TBD