Birds of a Feather Submission Guidelines


Submission Deadline: November 1, 2006 Due to an inconsistency in published due dates, the deadline for BOF proposals has been extended to November 10. n

Contents of this page

Important Dates

  • November 1:  Proposal Submission deadline
    (Extended to November 10)
  • November 27:  Moderator Notification
  • December 4:  Online Title and Organizer Modifications due, brief Birds of a Feather description due to BOF Chair

What is a Birds of a Feather?


Birds-of-a-Feather (BOF) Sessions provide an environment for colleagues with similar interests to meet for informal discussion. Proposers of BOF sessions should serve as discussion leaders only. BOFs are not intended to be presentations.


How Should the Proposal be Formatted?


Your proposal should include as much of the following information as possible. Please limit your proposal to one (1) page.

  1. Proposer:  Include name, address, phone and fax numbers, email address (expect most correspondence by email), WWW address (if applicable), etc. This item does not count in the page limit. Birds of a Feather proposals do not undergo blind review, so this information should be included.
  2. Statement of Topic: A short title (to be used in announcements), a longer title (if appropriate), and a brief description.
  3. Significance and Relevance of the Topic: 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. This information can help your proposal to be selected if resources become an issue.
  4. Expected Audience:  Briefly describe the nature and size of the expected audience. If you expect a particularily large or small audience, please explain why. This information can help in room assignment.
  5. Discussion Leader(s): Although my correspondence will be with the proposer above, it will be the discussion leader(s) who will be mentioned in Symposium literature. Please list any additional such names (besides the proposer her/himself) and affiliations here. Be certain you have their commitments to attend the Symposium.
  6. Special Requirements, if any: Because of the informal and spontaneous nature of these sessions, A/V equipment is typically not provided. That said, please describe any pressing needs you feel you have. Although I cannot guarantee that your requested equipment will be available, I will make every effort to let you know this well before March.
  7. No more specific formatting requirements (or templates) are needed for BOF proposal submission.

How Do I Submit My Proposal?


Step 1: Write your proposal using the format specified above.

Step 2: Convert your document into Adobe PDF format. Refer to our Creating Adobe PDF Documents page for assistance.

Step 3: Submit your document using the online Birds of a Feather Submission Form. Please do not wait until the last minute to submit your documents because that is when everyone else will be connecting to our server!

Step 4: Make note of the BOF ID number and password assigned to your submission. You will receive an e-mail message confirmation.

Step 5: After receiving confirmation, go to the Author Verification Form to review your submission for accuracy. Send e-mail to Bina Ramamurthy (bina@cse.buffalo.edu) if there are any problems. Warning! Several authors have reported problems viewing their PDF files using Internet Explorer. If you experience similar problems, it is best to download the file and use Acrobat Reader directly.

Deadline: All electronic submissions must be received by November 1, 2006.


How do I format my accepted proposal for viewing on line?


Here are sample BOF/Poster descriptions for the online program. We'd appreciate your replacing your original .pdf submission with this form and resubmit to the database by Dec. 4.


Questions? Please contact:


Bina Ramamuthry
SIGCSE 2007 Birds of a Feather Chair
bina@cse.buffalo.edu