Duties of IEEE RAS Distinguished Lecturers

IEEE Robotics and Automation Society:
Technical Activities Board (TAB)

Duties of IEEE RAS Distinguished Lecturers

The Distinguished Lecturer Program promotes the field of Robotics and Automation to the broad engineering community and to the public at large. Eight DLs are appointed per geographic region (Asia and Pacific, Europe, Americas, with at least three in each region from under-represented countries).

We encourage DLs to take the initiative to organize and present "Public Lectures": Public Lectures are aimed at non-specialists, and can be given in high-schools, senior citizens homes, science fairs, science museums, etc.

Distinguished Lecturers are proposed by the TAB and appointed by the RAS President Elect and serve for a two (2) year term, renewable only in cases of exceptional performance. A small budget is available to support air transport when DLs arrange speaking engagements with local IEEE Chapters. Please note that drawing from this budget requires that the local organization contact me at least 60 days in advance to approve the plan.

Duties of an RAS Distinguished Lecturer:

  1. Serve as an Ambassador for the RAS, promoting the field of R&A
  2. Arrange and Present at least 1 Public Lecture per year (see above).
  3. Present other lectures, for example to local IEEE Chapters
  4. Attend annual Graduates of the Last Decade Lunch at ICRA or IROS or CASE
  5. Respond to Press Inquiries
  6. Interact with relevant RAS Technical Committees
  7. Encourage young students and RAS membership
  8. Promptly submit semi-annual reports to VPTA on lectures given.

Semi-Annual Reports:

Please visit to enter report data: DL Activity Database

Please report all invited lectures you've given, excluding classroom lectures and paper presentations at Conferences. Each of your DL lectures should include at least one slide describing the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society and encouraging audience members to visit the RAS website: http://ieee-ras.org/

For each Lecture please report:

  1. date (dd/mm/yyyy)
  2. location (city/country)
  3. institution name
  4. title of lecture
  5. audience type (public, museum, high school, keynote, etc)
  6. approx audience size
  7. host name
  8. host affiliation
  9. transportation costs paid by IEEE RAS (confirmed by VPTA at least 60 days in advance*)
  10. additional comments

* There is a small budget available to contribute toward transport costs for DLs that present at local IEEE Chapters (when the local chapter agrees to cover all local costs).

Ken Goldberg
Vice President of Technical Activities (2006-2009)

goldberg@berkeley.edu