At CHI 2026, we’re very excited to announce the launch of a new Student Mentoring Program (SMP). The SMP evolves from CHI’s traditional Doctoral Consortium to a broader initiative that will cater to the needs of students at different stages of their career and give special attention to those who may need guidance the most. We are growing the program in terms of the number of participating students, trying to host a cohort that’s as diverse as possible, and expanding it to include new activities, going beyond the traditional deep dives into students’ research.
The renewed SMP thus reflects a changed vision centered on broadening access to resources for a wider range of early career scholars. It will provide them with resources to navigate CHI and, more broadly, their career in Human-Computer Interaction. Inclusivity is an important facet of this new program: we hope to accommodate more diverse students than in previous years, and efforts will be placed on supporting students who may lack institutional resources and mentorship for success. This program also extends a traditional Doctoral Consortium format to include a broader range of activities. While we will accommodate space for in-depth research discussions, as a traditional DC would do, we will also foster an environment where students at different career stages can network both with mentors and other peers. The program will have space for career guidance, for focused feedback and research dialogue, as well as opportunities for students to build the cohort with whom they’ll hopefully make lifelong friends and colleagues. We’ll host panels, roundtable discussions, poster sessions, and networking activities, trying to foster research exchange as much as we support students to find their own space within the CHI community. Some of these activities will require applying, and some will be open to all.
Overall, the SMP will allow a broad range of students at different stages of their career to:
- Gain new ideas and perspectives on their research directions;
- Support each other by constructively offering their feedback to the other attending students;
- Form new connections with other attendees, together becoming a supportive cohort of emerging scholars with a spirit of collaborative research; and
- Engage with the full CHI conference by participating in many of the events and opportunities that CHI offers, and by enjoying interactions with other CHI attendees.
A detailed look into the Student Mentoring Program
In practice, the Student Mentoring Program will include 2 official events which will take place during the afternoons of the conference. When submitting their application (via PCS, see details below or in the call for participation), students will be asked which activities they’d like to join:
Activity #1: CHI101 Information and Networking
We will host an information session where students at different stages of their Ph.D. will get advice on how to navigate conferences and get the best out of CHI. The session will be followed by a cohort-building activity for students at any stage to find peers with shared affinities, grow their network, and be inspired by each other’s work and ideas.
Activity #2: Roundtable Mentoring Session
We will host an in-depth mentoring session for mid-stage Ph.D. students, where they will get a chance to discuss their in-progress research with other peers as well as with expert mentors. Those participating in this activity will also be invited to showcase a poster at a general poster session.
Parallel activities
In addition to the above official activities of the SMP, we will also be hosting parallel activities such as a career panel (open to all conference attendees) or informal social events that won’t require a PCS submission or a formal invitation. These activities will be announced in the future. Please look out for those announcements.
Practicalities
The 2026 Student Mentoring Program will be completely in-person, taking place in the afternoons during the on-site conference. All official activities in the program are by invitation – that is, interested students need to submit an expression of interest on PCS by January 22, 2026, which will be reviewed by an expert jury. Since the program includes different activities meant for students at different stages of their training, students are invited to submit expressions of interest to participate in Activity #1, Activity #2, or both, based on their current stage and interests. Students should indicate the activities they’d like to attend and provide necessary documentation. Those who get an invitation to participate in any of the activities will be responsible for registering for the conference. Please read the call for participation (link below) for more details about the submission and reviewing process.
The submissions of students who are offered an invitation to attend Activity #2: Roundtable Mentoring Session will be published in the Extended Abstracts Proceedings of the conference. To that end, students will be asked to follow the instructions on preparing and submitting a final version of the Extended Abstract by the Publication-Ready Deadline. If they cannot meet these requirements by the Publication-Ready deadline, the venue chairs will be notified and may be required to remove their submission from the program.
To the more senior members of CHI: we need you!
The renewed Student Mentoring Program will need mentors. We invite senior members of our community (especially those of you who have benefited from the Doctoral Consortium in the past) to join us in supporting the new generations of CHI. Mentors of the SMP will be assigned a group of 5-6 students with whom they have research affinity, and asked to visit their poster at a general poster session to familiarize themselves with their work. After, at the Roundtable Mentoring Session, mentors will facilitate a roundtable discussion among their assigned students, fostering a conversation that cuts across their likely overlapping research. If you’d like to be a part of the program and help mentor this year’s cohort of CHI students, please contact the SMP chairs and express your interest: studentmentoring@chi2026.acm.org
See the CHI 2026 Student Mentoring Program (SMP) call for participation here: https://chi2026.acm.org/authors/student-mentoring-program/
Ferran Altarriba Bertran, Elizabeth Churchill, Yvette Wohn
Student Mentoring Program co-chairs