Birds of a FeatherSIGCSE Virtual 2026

A Birds of a Feather (BOF) session provides a space for researchers and practitioners with similar interests to meet for informal discussions. Proposers of BOF sessions should serve only as discussion leaders. BOFs are not intended to be presentations. Each BOF should involve active participation for attendees and should be planned for a 50-minute session.

BoF proposals should include plans to facilitate active participation for attendees of diverse backgrounds. Proposers may find the following resources helpful in identifying inclusive practices to include in the BOF activities:

• An inclusive meeting guide from Harvard University
• An article on facilitating effective discussions from the University of Waterloo

Authors submitting work to SIGCSE Virtual 2026 are responsible for complying with all applicable conference authorship policies and those articulated by ACM. If you have questions about any of these policies, please contact sigcsevirtual2026-bof@sigcse.org for clarification before submission.

BOF submissions consist of responses to a series of prompts rather than a PDF submission.

ACM has made a commitment to collect ORCiD IDs from all published authors (https://authors.acm.org/author-resources/orcid-faqs). All authors on each submission must have an ORCiD ID (https://orcid.org/register) to complete the submission process. Please make sure to get your ORCID ID in advance of submitting your work.

Submissions

All BoF submissions for SIGCSE Virtual 2026 will be done using a form on EasyChair. In addition to providing answers to the standard information (e.g., authors, ACM policy confirmations, topic selections, keywords), authors are asked to respond to the following questions. For each section (except the abstract), you may include references inline.

• Abstract: Please prepare an abstract of up to 250 words. This abstract will appear in the online program and in the conference proceedings. Abstracts should not contain subheadings or citations.

• Significance and Relevance: Please include information about any trends in relation to the topic and possibly describe (or cite) evidence to that effect. Your objective here is to explain why the topic is significant. You should also justify how your BOF session will enhance future connections between attendees. This information can help your proposal to be selected if resources become an issue.

• Expected (and Unexpected) Audience: Briefly describe the nature and size of the expected audience. Please explain how you will ensure that the BOF remains an inclusive space for all attendees, including attendees with different backgrounds or perspectives. If you expect a particularly large or small audience, please explain why. If you have a rough estimate of attendees based on previous years, please include it in the form.

• Background and Expertise of Discussion Leader(s): Give a summary of the qualifications of the discussion leader(s) as they relate to the proposed BoF session.

• Structure and Activities: Provide a brief description of the structure and activities planned for the BoF session. Proposals will be assessed on their potential to (1) facilitate active participation from attendees and (2) include attendees with diverse social identities and experiences.

We strongly recommend that you prepare this information in a separate document and then copy and paste it into EasyChair. EasyChair has been known to time out.

Accessibility

SIGCSE Virtual 2026 authors are strongly encouraged to prepare their submissions so that the content is widely accessible to potential reviewers, track chairs, and readers. Please see these resources for preparing an accessible submission.

Single Anonymized Review

Submissions to the BOF track are reviewed with the single-anonymous review process. Submissions should include author names and affiliations. Thus, the authors’ identities are known to reviewers, but reviewers are anonymous to each other and to the authors.

The reviewing process includes a discussion phase after initial reviews have been posted. During this time, the reviewers can examine all reviews and privately discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the work in an anonymous manner through EasyChair. This discussion information can be used by the track chairs, in addition to the review content, in making final acceptance decisions.

The SIGCSE Virtual 2026 review process does not have a rebuttal period for authors to respond to comments, and all acceptance decisions are final.

ACM Policies

By submitting your article to an ACM Publication, you are hereby acknowledging that you and your co-authors are subject to all ACM Publications Policies, including ACM’s new Publications Policy on Research Involving Human Participants and Subjects (https://www.acm.org/publications/policies/research-involving-human-participants-and-subjects). Alleged violations of this policy or any ACM Publications Policy will be investigated by ACM and may result in a full retraction of your paper, in addition to other potential penalties, as per ACM Publications Policy.

ORCiD ID

ACM has made a commitment to collect ORCiD IDs from all published authors (https://authors.acm.org/author-resources/orcid-faqs). All authors on each submission must have an ORCiD ID (https://orcid.org/register) in order to complete the submission process. Please make sure to get your ORCID ID in advance of submitting your work. See also the authorship policies.