1998 JOINT STATISTICAL MEETINGS

Guidelines for Invited and Contributed Sessions For JSM Program Committee Members

1.	Sessions are 110 minutes in total length. Allocation is discussed below.  The mandatory 5 
minutes opening by the chair and 15 minutes floor discussion are no longer “required.”

2.	One person may present at most one of the following (exceptions noted below):   
invited talk, invited poster, invited panelist, invited discussant, contributed talk, 
contributed poster, contributed panelist, contributed discussant.  In addition, one person 
may serve only once as a chair in an invited session or a contributed session.  Exceptions: 
presentation of a classroom tutorial lecture, a data exposition poster, or journal invited 
talks.  In addition, the JSM Program Chair may grant a waiver in special circumstances.  
A JSM invited paper web site will contain accepted invited session speakers (TBA).

3.	Sessions Defined by Invitation to Participate:

Invited Sessions - Participants are invited/selected by JSM Program Committee
Paper/Poster/Panel

Contributed Sessions - Members of co-sponsoring Societies invite themselves to
participate.  The invitations are accepted provided the members meet deadlines for
abstract submission, registration fee payment, and manuscript submission.  Final
organization of the contributed sessions is the responsibility of the JSM
Program Committee.
Regular Contributed Sessions
Special Contributed Sessions
Roundtable Discussions

4.	Sessions Defined by Session Content:

Theme Sessions are related to the JSM theme.  The 1998 JSM theme is
Statistics:  A Guide to Policy

Applied Sessions are sessions that will have a special appeal to applied
statisticians.  Such sessions will be noted by a special symbol in the program.

Session Sponsorship.  ASA Sections and co-sponsoring Societies for which a
given session has some appeal are listed as sponsors of the sessions in the
program.  The first entry in the list represents who had the primary responsibility
for the organization of the session.

5.	Invited participants who are not members of any of the co-sponsoring societies may have 
their registration fee waived.  Such individuals traveling from outside North America are 
eligible to receive some travel funds (requests to JSM Program Chair by November 14).

INVITED SESSIONS


Invited sessions are the responsibility of the JSM Program Committee to plan.  Invited sessions 
begin to be organized in the months before the JSM.  This year the March issue of Amstat News 
contained a call for ideas for the 1998 invited program.  The article included a description of the 
1998 theme, Statistics: A Guide to Policy, and a list of the entire 1998 JSM Program Committee.

Each JSM Program Committee member is responsible for planning some number of invited 
sessions.  A Program Chair often recruits and works with Session Organizers to complete this 
task.  Try to solicit input from many sources, including previous Chairs.  You should stay in 
close communication with Session Organizers since allocated session not completed by the 
deadline will be moved to the competitive allocation or JSM Program Chair pool.

Most of the Invited Sessions run concurrently with other Invited and Contributed sessions.  The 
ASA Presidential Invited Session, Deming Lecture, ASA Presidential Address, IMS Presidential 
Address, and the Fisher Lecture occur at times with no other competing sessions.

A new format of an Invited Poster Session was added to the 1997 JSM.  An Invited Poster 
Session will last 120 minutes and consist of 10-20 invited poster participants.  The invitation to 
poster participants may be made by the JSM Program Chair or any JSM Program Committee 
Member (in consultation with the JSM Program Chair).  This format offers more in the way of 
special A/V equipment to participants as well as twice the poster space.

1.  Organizers do not have to chair the session.

2.  Provide copies of Information for Invited Paper Session Speakers to participants.

3.  Session time may be allocated with great flexibility.  Sessions may contain a maximum of
     four invited speakers or five panelists, plus floor discussion.  Suggested formats:

       a.  3 IP + 0-1 D      0 + 30 + 30 + 30 + 10 + 10   vs.  5 + 25 + 25 + 25 + 15 + 15
       b.  5 Panelists
       c.  2 IP + 1-2 D      5 + 35 + 35 + 20 + 10           or    5 + 35 + 35 + 10 + 10 + 15
       d.  1 IP + 1-3 D
       e.  4 IP                   0 + 25 + 25 + 25 + 25 + 10

4.  Speakers should provide both a title and abstract to the Session Organizer (see deadlines).
     Individual Sessions should be communicated to the JSM Program Chair as completed.

5.  Discussants and speakers should have a clear understanding of the discussants’ role and when
     material will be provided to the discussant.  In large auditorium rooms, one discussant may
     act as a surrogate for a portion of the floor discussion and formal preparation may be optional.

6.  Send copies of all your correspondence with speakers and session chair (if other than yourself)
     to responsible section or society program officers.

REGULAR CONTRIBUTED SESSIONS


The JSM continues the open, non-competitive policy of accepting all contributed papers/posters. 
 However, non-refundable registration is required at time of submission, and a manuscript or 
draft must be received by a specified date.  Otherwise, the paper is withdrawn from the program.


Regular Contributed Posters: All contributed posters are listed together in the program and 
presented at the same time.  An attempt to arrange posters by topic rather than by society or 
section alone will be made in 1998.  Poster sessions are 120 minutes.  The poster space is 
available to participants 30 minutes before the session.  The poster space available to display 
materials is 4' by 6'.  A table and electrical outlet are also available to poster presenters.
Requests for special equipment (such as computer hook-ups) may be available.  Such requests
should be coordinated through the ASA Meetings Department.


Regular Contributed Papers: Starting in 1998, regular contributed paper sessions will contain 
7 papers of length 15 minutes followed by 5 minutes of floor discussion (total 110 minutes).  The 
first 15-30 seconds of a speaker’s 15 minutes is available for a brief introduction and setup.
The final 2-3 minutes of a speaker’s time should be reserved for floor discussion of that paper.
In consultation with the Session Chair, a speaker can arrangement for 0-3 minutes for floor 
discussion.  Speakers should be advised that adherence to the published schedule will be strict, 
and running over will not be possible.  A formal discussant cannot be accommodated in this type 
of session (but see Special Contributed Sessions).  Special A/V equipment is not available.

JSM Program Committee members meet to organize and schedule the contributed papers into 
sessions by identifying related topics among the abstracts and placing them in the same session.  
JSM Program Committee members also need to identify individuals to chair these sessions.  A 
chair must have an accurate watch and be willing to enforce the published schedule.


CONTRIBUTED ROUNDTABLE DISCUSSIONS

These sessions are organized along the lines of the current Roundtable Luncheons, and are 
intended for topics and issues that lend themselves to individualized discussion rather than 
platform presentation.  These sessions are placed on the program in a manner similar to that of 
the Special Contributed Sessions, with prior notification to the appropriate JSM Program 
Committee member, and with all the discussants (minimum 2, maximum 3) identified by an 
abstract as an organized Roundtable session and submitted to the ASA Office by February 1st.  
(All discussants must pre-register by the February 1 deadline.  They should indicate on their 
abstract form that they are part of a Roundtable Discussion, and which one.)  Roundtable 
discussion leaders must remain for discussion throughout the entire session period of 110 
minutes.  Flip charts are available for these sessions, but no audio/visual equipment.  Participants 
may move among the several Roundtables occurring simultaneously.


SPECIAL CONTRIBUTED SESSIONS

Special Contributed Paper: These sessions share a common topic and consist of a collection of 
5 contributed papers and an optional sixth speaker as discussant.  Special Contributed Sessions 
may have been organized originally as Invited Sessions for the competitive allocation.  However, 
this is not a requirement.  Any co-sponsoring Society member can organize a Special 
Contributed Session.  All Special Contributed Session organizers must coordinate their efforts 
through the cognizant JSM Program Committee member(s) that will be responsible for their 
sessions.  JSM Program Committee members must be acquainted with the details of each Special 
Contributed Session in their part of the program before the abstracts arrive at ASA.  This allows 
the JSM Program Committee members to identify the abstracts that belong to each Special 
Contributed Session and organize them correctly into the proper session.

These sessions are 110 minutes in length.  The talks may be 15 or 20 minutes in length.  A single 
discussant may be added for 10-15 minutes, in which case the floor discussion may be quite 
limited.  Suggested formats:

a.  Five 20-minute talks + 10 minutes floor discussion
b.  Five 20-minute talks + 10 minutes discussant (the last 2-3 minutes of each
        presentation should be reserved for floor discussion)
c.  Five minutes for chair + five 15-minute talks + 15 discussant + 15 floor discussion
d.  Mixture of five 15/20 minute talks + discussant + floor discussion


Special Contributed Panel: For this type of session, the traditional Panel Discussion format is 
used, wherein a minimum of three and a maximum of five panelists provide commentary on a 
topic.  Only one abstract is required for this type of session, although it must list all panel 
members, and it must be received in the ASA office by the February 1 deadline for contributed 
abstracts.  (All panel members must pre-register by the February 1 deadline.  They should 
indicate on their abstract form that they are part of the Special Contributed Panel and indicate 
which panel.)  As with any Special Contributed Session, the Special Contributed Panel organizer 
must coordinate with the appropriate JSM Program Committee member.  Also, JSM Program 
Committee members must be acquainted with the details of each Special Contributed Panel 
Session they are responsible for before the abstract arrives at ASA.


Special audio/visual and computer equipment will be made available for Special 
Contributed Sessions except in certain circumstances.  These requests need to be 
coordinated through the JSM Program Committee responsible for the session and will be 
confirmed through ASA.  (Regular Contributed Paper Session participants will not have 
special equipment available.)