As the spring semester ended, in addition to the NEOMED Writing Center work, I spent several weeks reviewing proposals for national conferences in the fall and spring semesters of 2023-2024. While every conference asks for different concepts in their proposals, there are four basic ideas that every proposal should contain.
- Explicitly link topic/argument to recent writing center scholarship, trends in the field or a related scholarly/community tradition of practice and values.
- Concretely articulate a purpose that addresses a gap or problem in theory, history, scholarship and/or practice.
- Clearly outline/summarize the content of the session/submission.
- Offer practical takeaways for conference participants that inspire new thinking and action around multiplicity.
Suggested way of organizing the description:
- The purpose of this (15-minute session, workshop, panel) is…
- Historically, this topic… (introduce a foundational source)
- Recently, the scholarship/trend… (multiple paraphrased recent scholarship)
- Specifically, this session will address this gap/problem in the research…
- By attending the session, panel, poster, etc., the attendees will … 1), 2), 3).
The NEOMED Writing Center is an excellent place for students, faculty and staff to collaborate and create presentation proposals and abstracts.
— submitted by Brian Harrell, writing specialist