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CORL Governance
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Foundation on Robot Learning Governance

Last updated: Nov 10, 2023

The Foundation on Robot Learning is an incorporated nonprofit entity. For the purposes of clarifying roles and responsibilities, here are the guidelines under which it operates.

Executive Board (corl-executive-board@googlegroups.com)

  1. The activities and affairs of CoRL shall be managed under the ultimate direction of the Executive Board.  
  2. The officers of the Executive Board are the President, Secretary, and Treasurer, and such other officers with such titles and duties as shall be determined by the Board.
  1. The President’s responsibilities are to:  
  1. convene and preside over board meetings, and address any issues that the Executive Board wishes to raise;
  2. maintain CoRL’s commitment to diversity at every level of operation.
  1. The Secretary shall have the responsibilities of:
  1. record and distribute the minutes of meetings;
  2. maintain communications across the different boards, schedule meetings and ensure that timelines are met;
  3. maintain and update credentials for long-lived conference-related assets, such as mailing lists, and the conference website.
  1. The Treasurer shall have the responsibilities of:
  1. maintain records of the Executive finances and coordinating with IFRR;
  2. maintain the history of sponsorship relations and contact information from year to year, to be collected from each outgoing General Chair or their Sponsorship Chair, and provided to the next General Chair or Sponsorship Chair.
  1. Executive Board officers serve staggered 3 year terms, at which point they may run for re-election.
  2. In addition to the 3 officers, the Executive Board shall consist of no fewer than 4 directors, and not more than 8.
  3. New Directors shall be elected by the Executive Board at each annual meeting of the Board.
  1. Nominations for new Directors will be solicited by the President and reported to the Executive and Advisory Boards two months before the annual meeting at CoRL.
  2. The voting for new Directors will occur at the annual meeting at CoRL.
  1. Directors serve for a term of 3 years, notwithstanding that two initial Board members will serve a term of one year, and two initial Board members will serve a term of two years.
  2. CORL General Chairs are invited to become members of the Executive Board.

Advisory Board (corl-advisory@googlegroups.com)

  1. The Advisory Board is a non-voting body that advises the Executive Board.
  2. When an Executive Board members’ term expires, they automatically graduate to become a member of the Advisory Board.
  3. Membership on the Advisory Board has no term limit.

CoRL General Chair Selection

  1. The three previous General Chairs constitute the Nomination Committee for the next General Chair to be recruited. Specifically, Chairs for years Y-1, Y-2, Y-3 nominate Chair for year Y+2.
  2. Two months before the annual general meeting, the Nomination Committee solicits and collects nominations. The Nomination Committee is expected to consider gender, ethnic and geographic diversity in soliciting nominations.
  3. At each annual meeting at CoRL, the Nomination Committee presents their assessment of the best possible candidates.
  4. The Executive Board ranks the top three candidates to be approached in ranked order, to be asked to consider taking up the position of General Chair two years later.
  5. The expectation is that the General Chair will host the conference in their home city, however, the General Chair is free to choose alternate locations in consultation with the Executive Board.

Roles and Responsibilities

  1. CoRL General Chair
  1. The General Chair’s responsibilities are to:  
  1. communicate regularly with the Executive Board
  2. recruit Local and Remote Chairs
  3. propose a slate of candidate Program Chairs, to be approved by the Executive Board
  4. secure approval of the Venue and above from the Executive Board
  5. recruit the various other chairs, such as publications, publicity-web, social-media, Finance Chair, etc.
  6. ensure a strong commitment to diversity and inclusion in CoRL.
  7. oversee planning and finances
  1. Program Chair
  1. The Program Chair responsibilities are to:
  1. recruit area chairs
  2. manage the paper solicitation process
  3. manage the review process
  4. have the final authority on paper acceptance decisions
  5. recruit invited speakers
  6. plan the structure of the program, in terms of schedule and activities
  1. Program Chairs are expected to share their program plan with the Executive Board well in advance of the conference submission deadline.
  2. Program Chairs have the flexibility to change the review process, e.g., rebuttal, author response, review mechanisms, but the expectation is that the conference is consistent in themes and maintains a high level of quality from year to year.
  3. Program chairs may recruit co-chairs to help spread the workload, but are ultimately responsible for the recommendations  made by the program committee.
  1. Local Arrangements Chair
  1. The Local Arrangements Chair’s responsibilities are to:
  1. prepare and manage a budget for hosting the conference, including both expenses and expected revenue
  2. coordinate with IFRR on managing finances. The local arrangements chair should have a mechanism for ensuring that they are not taking personal liability for lost deposits, etc.  
  3. identify the venues for different aspects of CoRL. The local arrangements chairs will need to coordinate with the program chairs on requirements, such as poster sessions, receptions, etc.
  4. arrange the venue and meals as needed
  5. arrange the registration
  6. coordinate with sponsors on providing them a place to meet with attendees

Executive Board Members

Last updated: Nov 9, 2024

General Chairs