EMPOWER 2021EMPOWER 2021IMPORTANT: Final Paper Submission Details & Format Updated Below
The 3rd EMPOWER Assistive Technology Conference will be held during 28-30 October 2021 at the International Institute of Information Technology Bangalore (IIITB), India.
EMPOWER 2021 will bring together all stakeholders in the Assistive Technology (AT) sector, including researchers, practitioners in the government and industry, people with disabilities, disabled persons’ organizations, special educators, inclusive designers, entrepreneurs, impact investors as well as policymakers engaged in different ways with issues involved in the creation, production and dissemination of AT solutions.
Continuing on the success of the previous two editions, EMPOWER 2021 is expected to see an active participation of the aforesaid stakeholders, not only to discuss existing solutions but also to brainstorm and seed ideas for future solutions in the AT space, especially from the perspective of the emerging challenges in the Global South. The conference will consist of the following tracks covering keynote talks, presentation of research and invited papers, posters, user and discussion forums, panel discussions and product demonstrations:
Keynotes: Talks by distinguished scholars in the area of AT
Plenary/Panel Discussions: Interactive discussions with an expert panel on the dais
Research Papers: (a) Papers accepted for oral presentation: peer reviewed, non-archived paper submission with talks of about 15 minutes duration; (b) Papers accepted for poster presentation: peer reviewed, non-archived poster presentation with talks of 5 minutes duration and poster display
(a) Product Expo: Stalls for ongoing product display; (b) Experience Zone: for different stakeholders to see, touch, try and experience some of the ATs meant for them
Birds of a Feather/Discussion Forum (BoF/DF): Participant driven, informal, deep-dive discussion sessions during evening/snack time. Minutes/summary of these sessions to be presented on the final day of the conference after the morning keynote.
Workshop/Tutorial: Long instructional sessions by experts on relevant topics, e.g. creating inclusive educational/corporate spaces, designing accessible courses, contents and pedagogy etc.
Conference accepts extended abstracts based on both original work as well as previously published work. Extended abstracts should be limited to a maximum of 1000 words and two printed pages including figures, references etc. In case of original work, extended abstract would be reviewed and based on the review outcome, it could be accepted under full paper, short paper or poster paper category and the authors would have to submit a suitable manuscript addressing the concerns of the reviewers.
In case extended abstract is based on an already published work, then the same should be explicitly mentioned in the submitted extended abstract. Based on the review, such extended abstracts may be included for presentation in the conference.
A paper development workshop will be conducted by senior researchers in the area of assistive technologies for the authors of accepted extended abstracts. More details will be provided along with the notification of acceptance to such authors.
EMPOWER 2021 is open to all areas that can assist in the integration of people with special needs in the society. The areas include but are not limited to education, mobility and transport, health, communication and entertainment. Please note that this year the submissions would be handled only through the EasyChair portal.
For formatting the the final version of the paper, please use the ACM conference format. Please see below the Paper type and the presentation duration
Paper type | Maximum length | Presentation Duration |
Long | 8 pages | 15 minutes |
Short | 4 pages | 10 minutes |
Final version of your paper should be prepared using a single-column submission format. The templates can be found at the ACM Primary Article Templates AND Publication Workflow page. Please refer to STEP 1 in Section 2: The Workflow and Templates.
Templates are available for both Microsoft Word and LaTeX. LaTeX authors should use the manuscript option to create a single-column submission (for an example, see “sample-manuscript.tex” for an example, which is included within the template download).
The final paper may directly be emailed to sujitkc@iiitb.ac.in.
Release of submission guidelines for extended abstracts of Research Papers: 25 March 2021
Submissions open for extended abstracts of Research Papers: 25 March 2021
Submissions close for extended abstracts of Research Papers: 31 May 2021 30 June 2021
Notification of acceptance: Mid August
Paper development workshop for authors of accepted extended abstracts: mid-August (TBA)
Submission of final papers: 25 September 2021
Queries and clarifications may be addressed to empower2021@iiitb.ac.in or to the ‘Research Papers and Posters’ Chairs. If you need more information about other conference tracks, please feel free to contact the respective Chairs.