Peer Reviewer Training and Certification

The publications team has launched a Peer Reviewer Training and Certification course hosted on the newly created ACM Peer Reviewer Gateway. The course aims to educate current and prospective reviewers on the principles and fundamentals of peer review and relevant ACM policies, and it offers concrete guidance on writing and submitting a review in a constructive and meaningful way.

ACM’s peer reviewers embody an integral role within the publications program as their expertise contributes to ensuring that sound and high-quality research is published at ACM. The certification component of the course is a means to acknowledge and incentivize this volunteer role, and can serve as an identifier to aid potential growth and progression within the community. Participants who successfully complete the course and certification exam will become an ACM Certified Reviewer. These reviewers can indicate the publications best suited to their interests. For participating ACM journals, the certified reviewer will be added as such to the reviewer pool in the respective peer review website(s) and will be easily findable by journal leadership.

The course (especially the Case Studies) offers valuable insights for seasoned reviewers as well as those new to the process, and we encourage all members of the ACM community to make use of this valuable new resource.