Call for Student Volunteers
RecSys 2026, the 20th ACM Conference on Recommender Systems, is the premier international forum for presenting new research results, systems and techniques in the broad field of recommender systems. The conference will be held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA, from September 28th to October 2nd.
Student volunteers are essential to the success of the RecSys conference. In return for help at the conference, student volunteers receive a number of benefits, including free conference registration, access to social events, and the opportunity to interact and network with top RecSys contributors and organizers. Being a student volunteer is a great way to network with the community.
Since the conference will be in-person this year, we are only looking for on-site student volunteers. Duties for on-site volunteers will include helping to set up and perform needed work during the conference, such as AV support, registration desk, poster and demo setup, break monitoring, guiding attendees to the offsite reception, etc. The volunteers will need to arrive on September 27th for the orientation and are expected to stay for the entire duration of the conference.
Student volunteers usually get to attend most of the sessions, even when working, so they will participate in all the conference content and activities. Scheduled hours depend on the type of volunteering activity and will not exceed 20 working hours.
QUALIFICATIONS
Volunteers must be students (undergraduate, master’s, or PhD) during the 2026-2027 academic year, or researchers who recently defended their PhD thesis (during the 2025-2026 academic year). Students of all backgrounds who are interested in Recommender Systems, regardless of discipline, are encouraged to apply. You do not need a paper accepted to apply, but it will be taken into account in the selection process. No previous student volunteer experience is required, but we are looking for enthusiastic and reliable people fluent in English. Furthermore, we welcome applications from local and international (geographically diverse) students.
APPLICATION
Submit your application via the following form. There will be two sets of deadlines this year. Applicants who cannot be accepted for the early deadline will be held over for consideration in the later cycle.
- Early Submission deadline: May 5, 2026
- Early Notification deadline: May 15, 2026
- Late Submission deadline: July 12, 2026
- Late Notification deadline: July 22, 2026
If you have any questions, please contact the student volunteer chairs.
SELECTION CRITERIA
Applicants must also be prepared to pay all costs associated with travel and lodging. Nonetheless, you can find a list of Travel Grants to be added soon with respective deadlines.
STUDENT VOLUNTEER CO-CHAIRS
- Amanda Aird, University of Colorado Boulder, USA
- Erasmo Purificato, European Centre for Algorithmic Transparency at European Commission’s JRC, Ispra, Italy