The System Dynamics Society holds its International Conference each summer. We are happy to have your support as a paper reviewer for the conference. We believe that we will have an excellent conference program with your help. This year we are continuing use of our web-based review submission system, which we believe is helping to improve the review process for both the reviewers and the program committee. The system is straightforward. We are using a rolling review process. Your review is due two weeks from the date of assignment. There are several things to keep in mind while filling in and submitting the review form:

1. Brevity is of great importance to the program committee as they deal with many papers. While there are no hard limits on the length of a review, we recommend 200 words or less for the "Short Review" comments (sent to both the author and the program committee), and 50 words or less for any program committee (only) comments. If you have a longer set of comments you would like to submit to the authors there is space to do so.
2. Once you have submitted your review, it is final. There is no way to modify a submitted review. Please check carefully that you have included all commentary you want before submitting the review.
3. There is no way to save a partial review on the web. We recommend that you write your commentary in a word processor and then copy and paste it to the web submission form. This will also be a helpful backup if a technical problem occurs and a review you submit is not properly received.
4. If you encounter any problems with the web review system, please inform us by e-mail at <conference@systemdynamics.org>.
5. Your unedited general comments and comments for authors will be available anonymously to the authors via the submission system. Your unedited comments for the program committee will be available to program committee members, but not to authors. 

Recommendations for a Good Review

A diverse academic and practitioner audience attends the System Dynamics Society’s conferences. The purpose of conference papers is to communicate advances in the methods, perspectives, and applications of system dynamics. Please review your assigned paper(s) for possible presentation at the conference. We believe a good review is one that approaches the work in a positive and constructive manner. However, constructive criticism is not the same as low standards; please do not hesitate to recommend for rejection papers of too low a quality to be included in the System Dynamics Conference. Be willing to recommend for rejection papers that are not related to system dynamics.

We will use your reviews to categorize papers into three groups:

• Plenary papers: Papers of high quality and of high interest to a significant fraction of the conference population. Plenary papers should be of value to almost everyone participating in the conference. Other criteria to be considered while recommending a paper for a plenary session are importance of work, significance of topic, originality.

• Parallel session papers: Papers of high quality and of interest to a more specialized group of the conference population. Papers of medium quality, but of high interest to attendees, may also be included in parallel sessions.

• Poster session papers: Papers of high quality and either (a) of interest to a narrow segment of the conference population or (b) appropriate for the direct, personal interaction that poster sessions permit. Papers of relevance to system dynamics that need improvement before being considered for formal presentation may also be recommended for poster sessions.

Your "Short Review:"

This should provide suggestions for improvement as well as observations on where the author has gotten it “just right.” Comments are very important for the authors to improve their work, so please spend enough time and energy in crafting them. Unconstructive or cynical comments are not helpful. A good review tells authors what is good and how to improve what is weak. Please keep the "Short Review" comments short. If you have detailed comments that would be helpful for the authors, but not for the program committee, please put these in the "Detailed notes to authors."  Both these, and the "Short Review" will be provided without editing to the authors. If you have comments that you do not wish to share with the authors, put these in the "Program Committee Notes."  The Program Committee will review the "Short Review" and these notes. NOTE Please do not repeat the contents of your "Short Review" - both the authors and Program Committee will see that anyway.

• A brief example of a bad review: “The authors fail to support their conclusions.”
• A brief example of a good review: “The authors should strengthen the reasoning and evidence marshaled in support of the conclusions. Specifically, …”

 

After you have posted your review you may look at it, but you will not be able to make changes. Once paper placement decisions have been made you will be able to see the status of the paper you reviewed and also the written comments of the other reviewers (except those addressed solely to the program committee).

 

If you believe this work has been previously published in English please note that in your comments to the program committee.

 

For more discussion of review content and review strategies take a look at Things to Remember when Reviewing and Refereeing Papers.

 

Again, please submit your review responses within two weeks from the date of the assignment. Thanks for participating in the review process! We look forward to hearing from you.

Program Committee

International Conference of the System Dynamics Society