Continuing Education Chairs/Presenters
Preparing the CE Course
CE courses offer a structured approach for gaining an understanding of a developing or established field. Because these are courses—and not other forms of Scientific Sessions—they are intended to present techniques, ideas, and concepts that are more established than those suitable for other sessions.
To create an influential course for attendees, presenters in a CE course can expect to be on an accelerated timeline regarding presentation preparation and coordination with others in the course. In addition to preparation through the last half of 2021, presenters must submit their final presentations by January 10, 2022.
CE Course Liaisons
A member of the CE Committee is selected as the liaison for each course. The course liaison is the immediate link between the course Chairs and SOT. While the course Chair organizes/finalizes instructors and the course content, the review and revision of the course materials are a coordinated activity shared by the course Chair and the liaison. The liaison assists in the communication between SOT and the Chair to ensure logistical support for the course before and during the presentation at the Annual Meeting. Course Chairs and CE course liaisons work closely together to present the best course possible at the Annual Meeting and to provide course materials to participants before the course.
Detailed instructions, timelines, and more information on finalizing CE courses will be added to this page as they become available. Contact Kevin Merritt with any questions.
Course Presentation Format and Guidelines
Presentation Style
The CE speaker slides are used to create the electronic course books that all attendees receive. As a result, when creating your presentation slides, the following style guidelines MUST be followed:
- Create a widescreen (16:9) PowerPoint presentation only.
- Use a consistent font (Calibri recommended) and size across all course presenters.
Recommended font sizes:
- Slide Titles: 36 pt
- 1st Text Level: 28 pt
- 2nd Text Level: 24 pt
- 3rd Text Level: 20 pt
- Make sure figures, images, charts, and graphs reproduce well by observing their resolution and readability. CHECK: If it is not very legible on your computer screen, it will not be legible projected in a room or in the course material.
- Pay attention to the detail level on the slide. If slides contain too much content, the text may be split into multiple slides in the electronic book production.
- Do not “stack” slide animations on a single slide. (i.e., do not place images on top of each other or remove figures to replace with a new one on the same slide. These types of animations do not show in a static course book and multiple slides should be created to show the same effect.)
- Deliver movie clips or other multimedia as individual media files along with your slide presentation. The recommended file type is .MP4.
- Obtain release for all copyrighted materials used and include proper attribution in the slides. Please note that the copyrighted materials will be removed from your presentation if there are pending copyright requests in process. This is for the legal protection of both the speaker and SOT and will be strictly adhered to. Therefore, adjust your course presentation accordingly before submitting to SOT Headquarters.
- Take inspiration from other highly rated and high-impact presentations: “Grouping Chemicals for Assessment and Conducting Assessments with the Hazard Index and Related Methods” and “Specific Aspects and Approaches for Regulatory Evaluation of Pharmaceuticals in Two-Year Rodent Carcinogenicity Studies”.
- DO NOT. . .
. . . include logos as branding elements or to indicate association/endorsement. If included, they will be deleted from your slides. (Logos that illustrate a point are OK to include.)
. . . use background colors, as they will make the content difficult to read in the electronic book.
. . . include slide numbers. Page numbers will be inserted into the electronic book and they will conflict.
Required Presentation Slides
For your benefit, SOT has created a PowerPoint Template of Required Slides for use by CE presenters, which is already in widescreen format. When using this template, each new slide added will be in a predetermined format/style that maximizes readability and usefulness during CE presentations and matches the recommendations listed on this webpage.
1. TITLE SLIDE
This slide should include: Presentation Title, Speaker Name, Speaker Affiliation, Speaker Address, Phone, and Email.
2. CONFLICT OF INTEREST DISCLOSURE
This should be the second slide after the Title Slide.
3. LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS/DEFINITIONS
This slide should come before any of the scientific content portions of the presentation.
4. SUMMARY/CONCLUSIONS
This slide should contain the key “take-home” messages from your portion of the course.
5. LIST OF REFERENCES
The list of references should be the last slide of your presentation or you may provide the list to Kevin Merritt as a Word document.
Please refer to Toxicological Sciences for the preferred style of citation and referencing of materials.
Course Timing
It is highly encouraged that the following course structure be used. While there is some flexibility for speaker times, begin, end, and break times are NOT flexible. For a detailed listing of possible presentation timing scenarios for your course, please consult the Standard Course Timing PDF.
MORNING COURSES
| 8:15 AM–8:30 AM | Welcoming Remarks and Introduction |
| 8:30 AM–10:00 AM | Speaker Presentations |
| 10:00 AM–10:30 AM | Mandatory Refreshment Break |
| 10:30 AM–12:00 Noon | Speaker Presentations |
AFTERNOON COURSES
| 1:15 PM–1:30 PM | Welcoming Remarks and Introduction |
| 1:30 PM–3:00 PM | Speaker Presentations |
| 3:00 PM–3:30 PM | Mandatory Refreshment Break |
| 3:30 PM–5:00 PM | Speaker Presentations |
Copyright and License Release Information
SOT requires that all presenters complete the CE Copyright and License Release Form. If you use material that you did not create yourself and for which you do not hold the copyright or that has been previously published, you MUST obtain a copyright release from the copyright holder or owner of this material. Proper attribution for this material must be included in your presentation and the electronic course book. This is for your own legal protection as well as that of SOT and is taken very seriously. Any information included in your slides should be treated as a published work. Any data or image that you would not include in a published article without proper permissions should also not be included in your slides. Please use the Copyright Clearance Center website for more information about copyright.
Almost all online journal articles have an option for securing copyright permissions through an automated process. Select options for “get rights and content,” “copyright permissions,” etc. to begin the process. The exact wording depends on the publisher.
For assistance and guidance regarding obtaining copyright permissions or completing the Copyright and License Release Form, please contact Kevin Merritt.
Guidelines for Use of Materials from Toxicological Sciences
SOT, as the publisher of the SOT Annual Meeting Continuing Education course books, is able to grant gratis permission for limited use of information from Toxicological Sciences, for which SOT holds the copyright. Toxicological Sciences is available electronically for free to all Full, Associate, and Emeritus SOT members. The slides and printed materials must include appropriate citation of Toxicological Sciences and must follow the guidelines and limits outlined below.
SOT has the copyright only to Toxicological Sciences; thus, this guidance is specific only to the use of materials from that journal. If it is imperative to use materials that also hold a copyright from other sources (e.g., journals, books), please communicate directly with the publisher of those materials and follow the appropriate citation guidelines.
Quantity Limits for Gratis Permissions for Use of Materials from Toxicological Sciences
Up to three figures (including tables) from a journal article BUT not more than five figures from journal issue/edition and not more than six figures from an annual journal volume.
Use of single text extracts of fewer than 400 words from a journal article BUT not more than a total of 800 words from a journal issue/edition.
FAQs
In disseminating information, it is important that SOT protect the intellectual property rights of others and of SOT. SOT claims ownership for materials produced by SOT, so it is requested that contributors give permission for use of their work and acknowledge that the content of the contributed materials is copyright free or that the contributor has permission to use any materials that are under copyright.
Government agencies usually retain a nonexclusive, royalty-free license to publish or reproduce work that is produced by employees, and they permit others to use and publish that work without further licensing or fees. By signing the License Release, you are certifying that SOT is free to use the material without infringing upon the rights of another entity.
Yes. Through the “License and Release for SOT Use of Materials” process, you are confirming that you are authorized by your employer to transfer licensing rights to these materials and that your employer has consented to all the terms and conditions of the agreement.
The form is used for any type of material that is provided to SOT. Please complete the sections that are pertinant to the material you are contributing. For example:
- “Materials created for”: provide the intended use of the items, which is a CE course.
- “Title”: provide the title of your presentation.
- “Text or slides,” “Photographs,” “Video,” “Other”: provide the nature of the material that you are licensing to SOT.
License Release grants permission from the “Author” (you) for SOT to license to reproduce, copy, electronically store, publish, and sell the materials as developed by the presenter. This licensing is independent of the copyright permission process. Copyright permission is necessary if the presenter used any material (e.g., images, information from other publications, or photographs) that is copyrighted by another author or institution. These may be items that you have previously published, depending upon your arrangements with that publisher, or material from other authors.
If any material in your presentation is taken directly from another source, you need permission of the author/publisher to use that material. However, if you take data from multiple sources and, for example, create a new table, that is your work and you would cite the source of the data but would “own” the new work. If an image you created was published and the publisher retained copyright, you could not use that image without a copyright release. However, you could use a similar image you created that had not been previously published.
Images, website screenshots, photographs, and text derived from internet sources may be copyrighted and cannot be used without permission and attribution. Some sites do have statements allowing free use, use for educational purposes, or other guidelines. It is important to track the source of material and the use statement on that site and proceed accordingly. Unless explicitly stated otherwise, the assumption is that materials are copyrighted or were borrowed without attribution/permission. Some materials are in the public domain and may be used freely. For example, US law defines the interval for intellectual property rights on some materials, and once expired, those materials may be used freely.
SOT provides a stipend designed to help defray expenses incurred for the preparation of the CE courses. Individual reimbursement for copyright permission will not be provided.
Yes, we ask all presenters to confirm that they will not have any copyrighted information by checking the appropriate box in the online form.
If the photo is copyrighted, you’d follow the appropriate procedures to get permission for use, which may involve a fee. In regard to photos you own or someone else owns, before SOT use, you need to provide proof that the person gives permission for the use of their image; a photo release form is used for that. Approval must be received in writing from parents for anyone under age 18.
Yes! In completing the Copyright and License Release Form, you are granting SOT permission to use the content you have created in a non-exclusive manner, meaning SOT is able to sell access to the CE course and course book that you contributed to, but you are free to re-use the content you have created in other settings.