How to identify quality Academic conferences

After the completion of researchers, the most common challenge faced by researchers is to find a good conference to present their research and a good journal to publish the research papers. There are plenty of academic conferences happening around the globe where researchers and academic staffs are receiving many invitations from those worldwide conferences. There are thousands of journals out there as well. On the other hand, many journals are yet to be published out there. Therefore, with the wide range of conferences, selecting an appropriate conference and the best journal is a hectic challenge for the researcher. In this article, we will discuss how we can identify a quality conference among the many fraud ones. An Article regarding “Journal selection” will be published in the near future.

The Quality of papers presented in conference and reviewing process

Quality of the papers presented at the conference would directly reflects on the quality of the conference. Usually quality of research is referred to scientific sound in the research papers. Quality conference organizers always try to maintain their standards by selecting best quality research papers. They follow a great reviewing process with an internationally recognized scientific committee. They strictly maintain the double blind reviewing process and give their maximum effort and time to review all the papers. If a conference accepts your paper without any comment or if they accept your paper really in short period of time (submit papers today and receive the acceptance letters the following day), you may have to be bothered as to whether they are undertaking a professionalized quality conference or if maybe they are a total imitation. Also some conferences accept machine generated research abstracts and send acceptance by an autonomous systems. With the past experience we have, we would insist you to be careful with those conferences. If in case you do have any doubt, do drop a mail to conference secretary or main coordinator. Once you are accepted by the conference’s evaluations team, feel free to contact the conference secretariat to inquire with the further tasks. You can easily recognize their professionalism by judging their replies and knowledge. If possible, do take the chance to speak with the conference chair person or the conference convener as well, providing you with firm confirmation of the quality of the conference.

Good keynote speakers who speak much relevant to the conference

One of the reasons we attend conferences, is listen to great people in a particular field. Therefore, it is a must that you go through conference websites. Get to know the Keynote speakers of the conference and do go through their profile. There might be one or several key speakers whose profiles are well renowned characters in that particular field of study or industry. If you feel those speakers are just names or some general profiles in the field, you may need to rethink about attending that conference. Some conferences ask participants to play as keynoters and some conferences publish keynoters even without informing them. So do drop a mail to those people and get a clarification as to whether they are the relevant keynote speakers or not. Some conferences publish teaser videos regarding invited speakers with their own words. Those act as indicators to identify best conferences. We are pleased to inform you that you may find good keynote speakers in many TIIKM conferences.

Serving the purpose and objective of the conference

There should be a purpose to hold a conference and most of good conferences are organized with the objective that enrich the research culture of that particular field of study. But many fake organizers also claim the same objective as their purpose. So you have to carefully check if these people conducting the conference are to mainly enrich the research. If they truly work with great vision, they have to continuously work on the quality of the conference, in every aspect. If the conference organizers facilitate great quality service for participants with more networking opportunities, great publications, flexible service and quality presentation, they are truly doing great.

Having strong Index Journals and publications

Many conferences publish and advertise that they are providing a good publication support for participants. But the bitter truth is that people are always frustrated with many unworthy persuasions. Before you attend a conference do check the conference publication section carefully. There will be mentioned as some journals as supporting journals. Check if those journals are legal and if they are from recognized publishers. Make sure those journals are indexed in an actual indexing organizations such as Scopus or Thomson Reuters.
Furthermore, take a quick glance at the past publications of the previous conferences. If this is the first time a conference is held, check on the organizers and if they are really publishing your full paper. Moreover, you have to check whether an ISBN number is provided to the abstract book, if an ISSN is available for proceedings, the availability of DOI number and also indexing. You can find best proceeding publications at the TIIKM publication.

Getting good support from ministries & the government sectors

If a conference has the affiliation with the local government body and if they published any government affiliations in the conference websites, it means the conference has a high credibility. Also, if government representations arrive as invited speaker, Keynote speakers or guest to the conference, this would again reflect on the credibility of the conference. Only the best of conference organizers work with the government trying to add more value to conference and in turn gaining the participants trust.

Having good number well reputed universities and partners

Good conferences have good partners. If the conference is joined with reputed universities, NGO’s, world recognized institutes or reputed companies, this indicates that they are maintaining their uniqueness. In AGRICO 2018 conference, there are more than 10 partnering institutes from different part of the globe, in turn giving good recognition for that conference.

Conferencing at well reputed venues

Some conferences are held in low budget hotels, airport transits hotels, rural hotels, some function halls, small rooms and small towns. Normally well reputed international conferences are conducted in better hotels or convention and conference centers in a famous towns with good tourist attractions. Also the management of the venue must be well aware about the event at least a several months backs. If the venue does not know about the conference, this signifies a weak point on the authenticity. So choose a conference in well-known locations and better venues.

Conference organizers networking with the participants

Attending to a conference is tough decision to make. You may have lots of things to consider before going to a conference in a foreign country. Starting few mail conversation with conference organizing committee regarding the program, accommodation, special arrangements, payment details and so on. The way the organizing committee respond to you and communicate with you will be a good indication about the conference. If they are professionals, the conference will ultimately be at its best standard.

Reviews from past participants and reputed personals in a field

Recommendations from ‘The Experienced’, would be one of the most important factor to make decisions. If your conference website advertises some good live recommendations (by videos), it signals that the conference indeed was a genuine one and it actually happened. Meanwhile, if a well-recognized person recommends a particular conference that means you can consider it seriously. Moreover, many conference organizers asks their participants to give their testimonials. However, as always, you can check their video channel (probably YouTube) and if there are hundreds of recommendations and speeches from renowned personals, you are truly in a better conference.

Past conference programs

If your conference is held annually, with a history of past conferences you will be able to find the past conference programs. If there are no such past conferences programs, that too arises a doubtful situation. Anyway if you can find the past conference programs make sure you go through those programs. You can get a rough idea as to how many participants from various countries are participating. If the conference was more international and with good quality papers then do look forward to attend that certified conference.

Details of conference chair, scientific committee and organizing committee

A good conference publishes all the information about conference chair, conference scientific committee and organizing committee. If you have any issue you may able to contact them and clarify your issues. Normally conference chair and organizing committee have to answer your questions. Check their details and their profiles. Get all your clarifications settled. If academic conference chair committee does not have strong academic knowledge about that field of study, then that would definitely be a problem. Also they have to have good knowledge regarding act as an editor of the conference.

Conference organizers

There are plenty of good and fake conference organizers around the globe. To select the best conference you need to select the best conference organizers as well. There are few organizations and universities who also organize conferences. However, you need to think about the return on investment when you invest for conference. Always try to find a conference which is organized by quality organizers who have good track of their record. Check their social recognition (FB, TWITTER), the reviews people have left on them (some conference organizers might have applied restrictions to social media or other photo galleries), the affiliations they received etc. If everything sound good, you are in a good hands.

We believe now you can get a good knowledge on how to choose a professional international academic conference to present your next research paper. We always welcome your comments and suggestions to improvise our knowledge as well. Send us a mail or leave us a comment. Wish you all have a great experience at the upcoming conferences.

Authors
Duminda Koralagamage
Duminda0728@gmail.com
Lorin Juliyana
Lorin@tiikm.com