ESC: Experience Sharing Conference

• Experience Sharing Conference (ESC) is a professional event model with decentralized governance, volunteer-led organization, and inclusive practices for early-career researchers.
• It employs a detailed planning timeline with structured milestones, adaptive logistic workflows, and robust digital communications to ensure seamless execution.
• The ESC framework integrates external grant funding, stringent cost-control measures, and comprehensive diversity and accessibility initiatives to enhance participant engagement.

An Experience Sharing Conference (ESC) is a professional, peer-driven event model designed to facilitate research dissemination, networking, and collaboration, specifically optimized for early-career researchers across academic fields. ESCs are typically organized by early-career volunteers, feature transparent and equitable program structures, and prioritize accessibility, diversity, and feedback-driven continuous improvement. The ESC framework is exemplified by the Emerging Researchers in Exoplanetary Science (ERES) series, which emphasizes reflective governance, cost parity, methodological rigor in participant selection, and adaptive logistical workflows (Levine et al., 24 Jan 2024).

1. Governance Structure and Organizational Model

ESCs employ a decentralized governance structure anchored by a voluntary Organizing Committee (OC), which, in the ERES 2023 instance, consisted of eight early-career researchers (six graduate students, two postdocs) distributed across Yale, Penn State, and Cornell, with continuity maintained by embedding a “past-host” advisor. Faculty mentors are consulted but lack executive authority over daily decisions.

Responsibility subdivision is implemented via distinct subcommittees:

• Logistics subcommittee: Oversees venue, catering, accommodation, budgeting, and travel reimbursement.
• Science subcommittee: Manages abstract intake, program curation, session chair allocation.

Decision-making processes heavily utilize asynchronous digital communications—weekly or biweekly Slack threads supplement one in-person all-hands meeting during early planning and nightly 20–30 minute synchronizations during the event. Task management is realized using Notion, configured with a Kanban-style to-do list and a Gantt timeline.

Key on-site roles include AV and catering point-persons, designated Code of Conduct officers (with both on-site and anonymous reporting via Google Forms), session chairs recruited from attendees (to foster ownership), and individualized “buddies” matched for travel and logistics queries (Levine et al., 24 Jan 2024).

2. Planning Timeline and Operational Workflow

The ESC planning horizon spans 9–12 months. Milestones are as follows:

Time to Event (T)	Activity
T – 9 mo	Secure host institution, foundational budget
T – 8 mo	Submit grant proposal (e.g., Heising-Simons)
T – 7 mo	Launch website, open registration, create Slack
T – 5 mo	Abstract call opens
T – 4 mo	Abstract deadline, begin double-blind review
T – 3 mo	Acceptance notifications, travel booking window
T – 2 mo	Finalize schedule, AV, and swag orders
T – 1 mo	Collect slides, finalize headcounts
T – 0 d	Logistics kick-off meeting
T + 1 wk	Post-conference survey (Slack)
T + 1 mo	OC debrief, complete reimbursements

This disciplined Gantt-driven approach ensures temporal alignment of funding acquisition, program development, logistics, and feedback collection. A plausible implication is that similar models provide a robust template for ESC planning across disciplines (Levine et al., 24 Jan 2024).

3. Funding Architecture and Budget Controls

Primary funding is sourced from external grants (e.g., Heising-Simons Foundation), typically covering full lodging, meals, travel grants, and waiving registration fees. Host institutions supply secondary, discretionary support. Attempts to secure corporate sponsorships (e.g., from the space industry) have not proven fruitful.

Budget categories include:

• Venue and AV rental
• Hotel rooms (single occupancy by default)
• Meals (all-inclusive except dinner)
• Travel reimbursements (full or partial, receipt-based)
• Conference swag (notebooks, pens, stickers, unique items like pizza-cutters)

To address oversubscription, cost-control measures are implemented: local participants within a ≤4 hr drive are requested to forego pre-event lodging, room-sharing is offered on an opt-in basis via the registration form, and session start times are adjusted to accommodate late arrivals.

A plausible implication is that granular cost controls and dynamic schedule adaptations are critical for ESCs operating under tight financial constraints and unpredictable attendance (Levine et al., 24 Jan 2024).

4. Participant Outreach, Selection, and Review Mechanics

Outreach is conducted via social media (with registration posts attaining ~10,000 impressions), word-of-mouth (the dominant channel per post-event survey), and departmental mailing lists.

The registration sequence includes:

1. Joining the Slack workspace,
2. Completing a Google Form (contact details, career stage, abstract details, talk/poster preference, reimbursement data),
3. Agreement to a clearly defined Code of Conduct.

Abstract review follows a double-blind protocol. Submissions are distributed randomly to pairs of science OC members. Scoring is performed on a 0–5 scale for Originality, Significance, Clarity, and Relevance (8 total per abstract); reviewer scores are normalized to a mean of 2.5. Final selection is ranked on a 1–100 scale, with conflicts of interest flagged and resolved by redistribution. All abstracts are accepted for poster format, while the top ~37 are assigned 12-minute oral slots plus 3-minute Q&A sessions.

Diversity is tracked via post-event surveys (≈40 % response rate). ERES hosted 106 attendees from 53 institutions across 4 countries. Respondents’ career stages were: 20 senior graduate, 14 early graduate, 10 postdoc, and 7 undergraduate. Gender pronouns and subfields were approximately balanced among speakers (Levine et al., 24 Jan 2024).

5. Program Configuration and Schedule Engineering

ESCs employ concentrated, three-day, single-venue schedules with plenary oral sessions (37 presentations), poster displays (64 posters with four interleaved sessions), professional-development panels, and optional social events (e.g., trivia night) and tours.

Scheduling principles include block planning, frequent breaks, and sandwiching oral sessions with Code of Conduct reminders. Poster halls on the same floor as talks maximize spontaneous interaction. Technical logistics (e.g., pre-session AV checks) are rigorously rehearsed. Innovations include participant-chaired sessions, location-themed swag (e.g., Yale mascot for group photography), and real-time reimbursement Q&A during lunch (Levine et al., 24 Jan 2024).

6. Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Initiatives

ESCs eliminate financial barriers via zero registration fees, full accommodation and meal coverage, and travel grants for all unbacked attendees. Codes of Conduct are explicit, defining harassment (including sexual harassment) and senior attendee responsibilities, with multiple reporting mechanisms (in-person, email, anonymous online forms).

Accessibility is addressed by co-locating all events at a single hotel, eschewing hybrid/remote options for budget and community rationale, and maintaining a single plenary space to reduce exclusion effects. Notable limitations in 2023 included absence of on-site poster printing support and lack of formal childcare or additional accessibility offerings. This suggests persistent tension between inclusivity ideals and budgetary/logistical constraints (Levine et al., 24 Jan 2024).

7. Assessment, Feedback, and Process Optimization

Post-event evaluation uses online surveys distributed via Slack (~40 % response rate), including demographic queries and nine Likert-scale metrics (communication, content, networking, panel utility, layout, and Code of Conduct enforcement). Feedback highlighted logistical issues (e.g., sight-lines, natural light), requested an expanded format (additional day, “flash talks” for posters), and suggested increasing survey engagement via live-polling in closing sessions.

Key lessons pertain to attrition management (e.g., 35 % dropout: 160 initial sign-ups, 140 acceptance, 106 attendees), reviewer normalization methods (mean-shifting without standard deviation rescaling to ensure simplicity), FAQ resource maintenance, and the necessity of simulating venue sight-lines with realistic occupancy to preempt technical issues (Levine et al., 24 Jan 2024).

By integrating these multidimensional governance, operational, financial, evaluative, and inclusivity strategies, ESCs establish a rigorous, reproducible paradigm for constructive, equitable conference organization across research fields.