“Sponsorship” means that the IEEE NPSS is the only organization that is officially responsible for the conference. It therefore has sole responsibility for all aspects of the conference, including all the surplus or loss generated by the conference.

For sponsorship, a host institute or university should be supporting the conference.

“Co-Sponsorship” means that the IEEE NPSS participates in all aspects of the conference, including the financial aspects, but shares responsibility for the conference, including financial responsibility, with some other not-for-profit organization. The main ways that Co-Sponsorship differs from Technical Co-Sponsorship are that with Co-Sponsorship, the IEEE NPSS will have defined responsibilities for conference finances, the technical program, and will share in any surplus or loss generated by the conference. For a cosponsored conference, either IEEE or NPSS will appear in the conference name. The requirements for Co-Sponsorship and process for applying for Co-Sponsorship are essentially the same as for Technical Co-Sponsorship, although the conference finances will receive considerable scrutiny.

“Technical Co-Sponsorship” means that the IEEE NPSS, usually through one of its Technical Committees, is significantly involved with the development of the technical program. The IEEE NPSS assumes no financial responsibility for the conference. The coverage of the $1450 fee to the IEEE for the technical co-sponsorship can be requested to be covered by IEEE NPSS via the Technical Committee chair. A motion has to be brought to AdCom and needs to pass. The conference is charged $22/paper if a conference record is published in Xplore. The conference is expected to provide a space for an IEEE member booth and waive registration for those supporting it.

• Your conference will be listed on the NPSS web site, bringing your conference to the attention of the NPSS membership.
• Your conference will be included in the IEEE Conference Search Directory, providing an opportunity for even wider promotion of your conference.
• You may use the IEEE and NPSS logos on your web site and other promotional materials.
• With prior agreement, manuscripts originating from the conference may be published by IEEE in a Conference Record as part of the IEEE Conference Publications Program, and/or selected papers from the conference may be published as a special issue of the Transactions on Nuclear Science or Transactions on Plasma Science (subject to the usual peer-review process for the journals).

• A significant component of the conference content must be in technical fields served by the NPSS.
• The NPSS must have direct and substantial involvement in the development of the technical program of the conference. This generally means that one or more NPSS members who are approved by the NPSS AdCom, usually upon recommendation of one of the NPSS Technical Committees are members of the Technical Program Committee or play some other major role in the conference organization (General Chairman, Program Chair, Publication Chair, etc.). The NPSS objective is to have at least one NPSS person in a position to help set the conference policy for most aspects of the technical program including accepting submissions; to have first-hand knowledge of how this policy is implemented; and to keep NPSS informed about the development and implementation of the technical program.
• For technical co-sponsored conferences, the IEEE name shall not be used in the name when IEEE is less than a 25% financial sponsor but, the IEEE brand/logo and/or IEEE organizational unit brand/logo may be used in conference publications and promotional material. For conferences which are co-sponsored 50:50, the logo is required to be used. The IEEE name may not be used in the conference title. The term IEEE shall be used in the name of sole sponsored and co-sponsored conferences where IEEE is at least a 50% financial sponsor.
• The conference promotes the IEEE and NPSS by including their logos on the conference promotional materials and web site and by distributing promotional materials supplied by NPSS at the conference.
• In general, NPSS will not Technically Co-Sponsor conferences that are held within two months of an NPSS conference that is on substantially the same topic.
• The relationship must have some benefit to the NPSS mission and membership, such as the dissemination of technical information in an area of substantial interest to the NPSS community.
• Formal approval and a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that is signed by the NPSS are required.
• If there is agreement on having the conference proceedings published by IEEE, the process to review submissions for presentation must be fully defined. Some fee for publication may be charged to the conference, and manuscripts published by IEEE must conform to all IEEE publication policy, review, and formatting requirements.

The first step is to contact the Chairman of one of the NPSS Technical Committees, because, usually one of these Technical Committees brings the application to the NPSS AdCom (governing board). Give the Chairman details of your conference (topic areas, dates, location, size, etc.), and also address the “Requirements for Technical Co-Sponsorship” listed in the previous section.

If you are interested in having manuscripts originating from the conference published by IEEE, you should also describe your publication plans (e.g., publishing a Conference Record or in either the IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science or the IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science), as well as defining the process for reviewing papers submitted for presentation and therefore publication. If you are contemplating having IEEE publish a Conference Record, you should contact the NPSS Publications Chairman. If you are contemplating publishing in the Transactions, you should also contact the Editor in Chief of the appropriate Transactions. Note that any manuscript published by IEEE will be subject to the same standards and review process as all other manuscripts submitted to that publication.

Expect some iteration / discussion with the Technical Committee in preparing the proposal and the MOU. Once the proposal for Technical Co-Sponsorship is complete, the Chairman of the Technical Committee will bring it to the NPSS AdCom, which meets three times per year. Thus, it is important to start the process early.

If AdCom approves the proposal, you will need to fill out an IEEE Form.

For conferences which are co-sponsored 50:50, the NPSS logo is required to be used. The IEEE name may not be used in these co-sponsored conference titles. The term IEEE shall be used in the name of sponsored and co-sponsored conferences where IEEE has at least a 50% financial sponsor.

For technically co-sponsored conferences, the IEEE name shall not be used in the name when IEEE is less than a 25% financial sponsor but, the IEEE brand/logo and/or IEEE organizational unit brand/logo may be used in conference publications and promotional material.

Any fully sponsored NPSS Conference and NA-PAC will be allowed to advertise at any other NPSS conference using the following guidelines:

Posters will be allowed that are no larger than A4 size (210 x297 mm) or no larger than the host conference poster size. Posters shall be placed under supervision of the conference General Chair or his/her delegate.

Other advertising material such as calls for papers may be made available with permission of the conference organizing committee.

Note that technically cosponsored conferences are excluded from this privilege and may not place posters or other advertising materials at fully sponsored NPSS conferences or NA-PAC.