Call for Doctoral Consortium

The Intelligent Virtual Agents (IVA) 2026 Doctoral Consortium occurs September 11, 2026, the day after the main conference. We invite Ph.D. students working in the area of intelligent virtual agents to present their research to peers and a panel of distinguished researchers, who will provide students with valuable feedback, additional ideas, and suggestions regarding parallel ongoing work. We will also pair each attendee with an expert mentor to provide individualized feedback and guidance. The Doctoral Consortium will also introduce students to a network that can be very helpful with their career once they graduate. We particularly encourage applications from Ph.D. candidates who have made some progress on a clear topic and research approach, but are not too far advanced to benefit from feedback and guidance.

Based on student applications, the organizing committee will select a group of students that will be invited to participate. Attendees will present their work in three formats to give them practice addressing audiences in a range of venues: a 2-minute flash talk, a 20 minute oral presentation, and a poster presentation.

Submissions consist of the following:

1. A four-page extended abstract of the student’s thesis work (in the IVA submission format) submitted through the IVA submission site (please select the Doctoral Consortium track).

2. A short (2-page) resume (Curriculum Vitae) of the student.

3. A recommendation letter from the student’s advisor/supervisor.

These items should be emailed to the consortium chairs Timothy Bickmore (t.bickmore@northeastern.edu) and Stefán Ólafsson (stefanola@ru.is).

The student’s advisor/supervisor should directly email their letter of recommendation to the consortium chairs by the same deadline. The letter should address the expected benefit of the student attending, the significance of the research, and the anticipated graduation date of the student.

Important dates

Submission Deadline: July 1, 2026

Notification: July 31, 2026

Doctoral Consortium: September 11, 2026

Registration details for the doctoral consortium will be announced later.