PES Paper Presentation Policy Change

The requirement for a Transactions paper to be presented before publication was rescinded by the PES Governing Board at its July 1995 meeting. The PES Executive Committee, at its October meeting, approved various operational procedures to implement this decision and directed the Technical Council to develop the necessary procedural modifications to be implemented for the 1997 Winter Meeting. With this change, papers may be submitted at any time during the year for publication in the Transactions and, if accepted, will be published without the requirement for prior presentation.

The major goals of this change in policy were:

• To improve the quality of our technical sessions by providing technical committees with the flexibility to be creative in their design of technical sessions Without the requirement to present every paper. Technical committees can organize paper sessions, panel sessions, and symposia based on topics of greatest importance and current interest. It is believed this change will improve the lagging attendance at technical sessions.
• To relieve the paper review 'crunch' that occurs with all papers arriving at two designated times per year. Paper review will be spread throughout the entire year and artificial deadlines will be eliminated.
• To eliminate the travel requirement and language limitations associated with required paper presentation. This will encourage international participation and allow technical committees to select high quality papers without respect to travel or language limitations.

This policy will change the ways the technical committees meet their responsibility in a number of areas. One obvious change will be in the paper review process. Since publication will no longer be formally tied to presentation, it means that the formal deadlines for paper submission will vanish. Instead, a review period will be established for each paper keyed on its receipt date at headquarters.

• Presentation will not be required in order for an approved paper to be published; however, the author will be provided an opportunity to discuss the merits of his or her contribution with peers. The opportunity will take different forms than in the past, however. Presentations may be made at a general meeting, at an otherwise scheduled meeting of the reviewing committee, or at any PES-sponsored conference using one of the following formats:
• Presentation may be selected by the author in a poster session planned by the reviewing committee.
• Presentation may be recommended by the reviewing committee to be a part of a panel session interned to provide broad coverage of an area of current interest. The author may decline.
• Presentation may be recommended by the sponsoring committee to be a part of a directed educational program intended to be instructional in nature. Presentation may be allowed up to an hour for in-depth presentations. The author may decline.

Changes will be needed in the PES infrastructure to support this new publication policy and meeting structure. The Technical Session Improvement Committee will focus on identification of the tools and techniques necessary to implement this change. Emphases will be placed on the quality of the technical sessions at our General Meetings. Jim Harlow of Beckwith Electric is chair of this committee and will gladly receive your input. Each technical committee is represented in the Technical Sessions Improvement Committee and you may contact those representatives, or Harlow directly. While additional efforts will be needed to organize technical sessions, we expect considerable rewards, including more productive sessions and meetings of greater interest to members.

The requirement that an author be prepared to answer any and all questions from an audience concerning his paper will not change. As in the past, verbal discussions during any presentation will not be published. We will still accept written discussions to be published with a paper I received within the prescribed period following final approval. Individual committees may wish to further organize ways of encouraging and receiving discussions. Paper preprints will continue as long as they are deemed necessary and economically justified. Once in the hands of interested discussers, existing rules for submission, approval, and response will apply.

This change brings the PES in line with virtually all professional societies. The presentation requirement for publication served PES well for many years, but the needs of our industry have changed and the preferred means of presenting technical material no longer centers on paper presentation at General Meetings. This change allows PES to reorganize our technical sessions to meet members needs and provides the flexibility needed to maintain the high quality of the Transactions. Your comments on this change are welcome at any time.

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