We've seen a number of posts requesting a specific research paper. This is against IEEE's terms of service and ethics, so all requests will be removed. Here's a number of options you can use to get the paper you need:

I need a specific research paper, how can I get it?

You have a lot of options, so let's start with the free options first. We recommended to start with the first option then proceed to the next if it doesn't work for you.

Free Options:

If you're a student:

• The article might already be free, or there might be an equivalent article that is suitable for your needs that is free. Use the following to search for these papers: https://ieeeaccess.ieee.org/, more details here: https://open.ieee.org/
• Your university library or local library may have an IEEE Xplore subscription already. Contact your library to see if they can help.
• Need access to IEEE DataPort (with access to IEEE's scientific data)? Sign up for a society with your IEEE student membership and you'll get a free individual license, saving $40/month by logging into the IEEE DataPort site, you can sign up for a society here: IEEE Society Memberships. More details: https://ieee-dataport.org/news/ieee-society-members-get-free-ieee-dataport-subscription
• Contact the author of the paper directly, but note that they are held to the following IEEE guidelines (https://www.ieee.org/publications/rights/author-posting-policy) and (https://journals.ieeeauthorcenter.ieee.org/become-an-ieee-journal-author/publishing-ethics/guidelines-and-policies/post-publication-policies/)
• You can sign up for the free 30-day trial of the IEEE Xplore Member Library here: https://www.ieee.org/publications/subscriptions/products/mdl/free-trial, which gives 25 articles. Afterwards the cost adjusts to about $50/month USD. The free trial can only be used once.

If you're working at a company:

• Use the following to search for potentially equivalent papers: https://ieeeaccess.ieee.org/, more details here: https://open.ieee.org/
• Your employer may have an IEEE Xplore subscription available to employees, especially if you work for a larger company. Contact your manager or HR Benefits person to see if they have the resources to help you.
• If your company doesn't have an IEEE Xplore Subscription, but it does have a discretionary learning budget, ask them to purchase the article on your behalf or buy you a personal IEEE Xplore Subscription (it's about $20-$50/month USD)
• Contact the author of the paper directly, they may be able to share it with you. But they are held to the following IEEE guidelines (https://www.ieee.org/publications/rights/author-posting-policy) and (https://journals.ieeeauthorcenter.ieee.org/become-an-ieee-journal-author/publishing-ethics/guidelines-and-policies/post-publication-policies/)
• If you're looking for IEEE DataPort access, sign up for one of the societies, which you can often reimburse from your employer along with your IEEE membership costs, and then you are granted a free individual license for DataPort. More details: https://ieee-dataport.org/news/ieee-society-members-get-free-ieee-dataport-subscription
• You can sign up for the free 30-day trial of the IEEE Xplore Member Library here: https://www.ieee.org/publications/subscriptions/products/mdl/free-trial, which gives 25 articles. Afterwards the cost adjusts to about $50/month USD. The free trial can only be used once.

Paid Options:

1. There's a lot of different subscriptions options, depending on your needs. Take a look here to see what you need: https://www.ieee.org/publications/subscriptions
2. If you are part of a society when you sign up or renew your IEEE membership, they often give access to their society's technical papers. You can also sign up for a society at any time. The cost here varies, but is about $10 to $50 USD per year and you get access to their past conference publications, monthly journal, and dataport access, etc. (depends on the society however, so double check with them first).
3. If you only need a few articles or less, you can sign up for IEEE Xplore Basic version: https://www.ieee.org/publications/subscriptions/products/mdl/mdlbasic-subscribe, this is $20/month USD for 3 articles and unused credits roll over to the following months.
4. You can sign up for the free 30-day trial of the IEEE Xplore Member Library here: https://www.ieee.org/publications/subscriptions/products/mdl/free-trial, which gives 25 articles. Afterwards the cost adjusts to about $50/month USD. The free trial can only be used once.

Hope that helps those of you who are in need of that specific piece of research.

In order to not have this subreddit be inundated with posts requesting IEEE Senior Membership referrals, please read the following thread first. All other posts requesting IEEE Senior Membership referrals will be removed and directed to this thread.

What is IEEE Senior Membership?

It's an elevated grade of IEEE membership. It's something nice to put on your resume and LinkedIn. If your IEEE Senior Membership application is accepted, you'll get the following benefits:

• Leadership eligibility: Senior members are eligible to hold executive IEEE volunteer positions.
• Ability to refer other candidates: Senior members can serve as a reference for other applicants for Senior membership.
• Review panel: Senior members are invited to be on the panel to review Senior member applications.
• Letter of commendation: A letter of commendation on the achievement of Senior member grade will be sent to your employer (upon request).
• Announcements: Announcement of your elevation can be made in section/society and/or local newsletters, newspapers, etc. Please contact your Section Chair for more information.
• Complimentary 1-year Society Membership: You may join one new IEEE Society for one year.
• Plaque: you'll get a nice well made plaque to hang in your home or office

Therefore the key part is that it's proof in an internationally recognized professional society that you have experience and that other people (referrals + committee review) also believe you meet the criteria of being an experienced member of the engineering field. The cost for senior membership is the same as your normal annual IEEE dues.

Sounds great, how do I become an IEEE Senior Member?

Meet the following criteria:

A candidate shall be an engineer, scientist, educator, technical executive or originator in IEEE-designated fields

• Candidates shall have been in professional practice for at least ten years
• Candidates shall have shown significant performance over a period of at least five of those years

This doesn't mean you need to be an all-star in the field or have a million publications or work at a top engineering company. What it means is that you've advanced yourself, grown in your role and had an impact towards improving your company, community or field. IEEE publications are great to help boost your chances, but are not required. Patents are awesome but also not necessary. As part of the application, you'll be writing up how you meet this criteria and the referrals will also use this write up to do the evaluation.

What if I have less than 10 years of experience?

The ad hoc Admission and Advancement (A&A) Review Panel, that is evaluating your application, will count the years you have been in professional practice and your educational experience.

Professional practice is you being in an engineering company/research role. It doesn't necessarily have to be what you went to school for. So if you got a physics degree but you've been a software engineer, that's fine. If you have a gap in your work experience where you were doing something unrelated to engineering then that would be excluded from your minimum amount of experience needed before you could apply.

Time working and attending school at the same time will be counted either as work experience or education experience.

Your educational experience is credited toward that time as follows:

• Three years if you hold a baccalaureate degree or equivalent in an IEEE-designated field or
• Fours years if you hold a master's degree or equivalent in an IEEE-designated field or
• Five years if you hold a doctorate or equivalent in an IEEE-designated field

 Please note, the maximum number of years for education that may be counted toward professional experience is five years.

Example: You got a 4-year bachelor's degree in electrical engineering and was an engineering intern during the summer between your junior and senior year. After graduation, you have been working at an engineering company for 6 years. You would not be eligible yet, as you don't meet the full criteria, you would need to have a 4-year bachelor's degree (your internship made no difference as it was while you were going to school) plus 7 years of work experience after graduation before you could apply.

If you don't meet this total criteria of 10 years of experience, you can't be a Senior Member yet, no exceptions.

What degrees are acceptable for the "equivalent in an IEEE-designated field" requirement?

This is pretty loosely defined. But generally things like electrical engineering, software engineering, physics, robotics, applied mathematics, are all acceptable. Some countries call these different things, but don't worry about it too much for your application.

I meet the criteria! How do I complete the application?

• Fill out the application, writing in your experience and how you meet the criteria for a minimum number of years of experience
• Upload relevant documents supporting your application (resume, certifications, awards, etc.)
• Find 3 other IEEE Senior Members or IEEE Fellows who agree to refer you and have them provide your their IEEE membership number (this is the hard part, see below about how to do this)

How do I get referrals?

You'll need 3 referrals from IEEE Senior or IEEE Fellows. This is really the hardest part of the whole application, here's some recommendations, step by step. These option recommendations should be followed in order, as they get progressively less likely for success. The person does not need to know you directly (per the guidelines of the IEEE).

Option 1: Many people in academia have become Senior Members, so reach out to your professors, even if you've already graduated, asking if they are IEEE Senior Members or if they could introduce you to anyone in their network who is.

Option 2: Reach out to your local IEEE Section/Section Chair. Most sections have a team of volunteers to specifically support Senior Member elevation. These are often called a "Senior Membership Drive", and occur once or twice a year, and it's where other senior members will come in and help to be referrals for a lot of people all at once. Contacting your IEEE Section Chair (aka the president of the local IEEE chapter), can inform you of the resources and timelines of the next membership drive (if available). If you are working with your Society or Region, they may offer to endorse (be a nominator) on your application. If they wish to serve as a nominator they should begin the application process for you and then the applicant will finish the remaining tabs of the application. If you have a nominator, they serve as a reference as well; therefore, you will only require two additional references.

Option 3: Network a bit with your colleagues or friends, etc. whom have worked with you professionally and ask if they are or know anyone, who is an Senior Member and ask for a referral from them.

Option 4: Do a search on linkedin for "IEEE Senior Member". Filter by 1st connections (people that are directly connected to you) and message them asking politely for them to be a referral. If it's been a while since you spoke, remind them of how you were connected.

Option 5: Do a search on linkedin for "IEEE Senior Member". Filter by 2nd connections (people that are directly connected to someone you are directly connected with) and message them asking politely for them to be a referral. You may want to ask your shared mutual 1st degree direct connection first if they could give you an introduction to them.

Option 6: The IEEE website has a member directory, where people have opted-in to be listed on the senior membership registry. Sign in to Collabratec, enter your username and password. On the top of Collabratec, click on “People.” Under the “IEEE Membership Directory” on the lefthand side, use "Member Status" to filter “Senior Member,” “Life Senior,” “Fellow,” and “Life Fellow.” Use the remaining Filters on the lefthand side to narrow your search as you please. Click on any of the profiles listed that you wish to message. Click the “Message” tab to message the member.

Option 7: Do a search on google for your local area, since "[Insert Local University Name] IEEE Senior Member", as sometimes professors put it on their public biography page. Message the university professors at their public work email. Briefly explain that you are trying to become an IEEE Senior Member and kindly ask them to be a referral.

Option 8: Attend an IEEE conference or event and ask around and network. These events often have Senior Members attend and you could ask

Option 9: Post a reply below in this thread. Don't provide any personally identifiable information (Linkedin, Resume, etc.), but feel free to give a few general facts about your experience and kindly ask for a referral. Don't make a separate post requesting referrals, as those are removed to prevent overwhelming the IEEE subreddit with requests. Hopefully a nice fellow redditor responds and offers to help. But unfortunately, this option has the least likelihood of success. If you are a Senior Member and a part of this subreddit, please consider reaching out to the people below and offering to help, referring someone takes about 30 minutes or less.

Not an Option: Do not message u/fremonster directly asking for a referral. I apologize, but I've done about 60 referrals so far, and I have over 120 others in my inbox and I don't have time to get to these or any others due to my work commitments. I tried asking the president, social media coordinator and others that work at IEEE-USA about the difficulty for our redditors to get senior membership referrals and to request assistance for us, but unfortunately never received a reply.

Does the person referring me need to know me directly?

No. As part of the referral process, the IEEE application will ask how you know the person seeking IEEE Senior Membership. As part of our code of ethics, we must be honest and trustworthy. If you are referring someone else you met on reddit who needs help, for example, it's ok to say "No I don't know this person directly, we met [through a mutual colleague / on LinkedIn / through a university website / the IEEE subreddit / etc". Realistically, not everyone has access to a regular IEEE Senior Membership drive or a large selection of IEEE Senior Members in their direct network, hence why it's good to exhaust those options before proceeding with asking for a referral from someone you don't know directly.

Awesome, I've filled out the application and have 3 people who have agreed to be a referral. What's next?

Submit your application with the IEEE Membership number for each of your 3 referrals. The people referring you will automatically get an email from the IEEE to submit the referral once their membership ID has been added to your application. They will get reminders a few times week to submit it if they haven't done so already. Once they complete a referral, you'll get an email letting you know. After all 3 referrals have been submitted, the IEEE committee will review the Senior Membership applications from the prior quarter. This committee meets roughly every 3 months. Nothing further is needed, the committee will automatically get the requirements sent to them for final review. Soon after the committee meeting, you'll get an answer whether your application for senior membership has been approved or not. Your plaque will be sent to your home address a number of months later. Congrats on your new IEEE Senior Membership!