Grassroots Program Proposal

Thank you for your interest in submitting a “Grassroots” program proposal for the 2009 ALA Annual Conference to take place July 9-15 in Chicago.  Before you proceed to the proposal form, here is some information and a few ground rules you must be aware of:

Purpose of a Grassroots Program:

Eligibility:

Proposals can be submitted by a single ALA personal member or by any group of ALA members who do not serve together on a committee or board within ALA.  If the proposal is being submitted by a group, please designate one individual to be the program coordinator who will serve as the main contact for any matters regarding the program.

• Proposals can address any topic of interest to ALA members
• Proposals must be original; they cannot replicate a program previously presented at an ALA Annual Conference, Midwinter Meeting, or national divisional conference
• Proposals previously submitted to a committee, board, or task force in ALA, one of its divisions, or one of its round tables, cannot be resubmitted
   

Proposals will be judged on: 

• Relevance of the program’s topic to ALA members and the profession at large
• Timelines
• Knowledge of proposed speaker(s) on the topic
• Originality – i.e., the degree to which the proposed program looks at a topic in a new and fresh way or treats a topic that has not received as much attention as it deserves, either because it is very new or due to some other factor

Proposals can address ALA’s key action areas:

•  Diversity
• Equitable Access to Information and Library Services
• Education and Lifelong Learning
• Intellectual Freedom
• Advocacy for Libraries and the Profession
• Literacy
• Organizational Excellence or other areas.

Jury:

A jury will select the proposals to be presented at the 2009 Annual Conference.  The jury will be made up of members of the student ALA chapters at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and UCLA as well as several members of Jim Rettig’s presidential initiatives advisory committee.

Submission procedures:

Proposals must be submitted using the Grassroots Program proposal form that follows.

Deadline for submission:

February 6, 2009

Notification of decisions:

The contact person named on each proposal form will receive notification of the jury’s decision during the week of March 9, 2009.

Publicizing program:

Each selected program will be listed in the program book for the 2009 ALA Annual Conference and will be noted as being part of the Grassroots Program Track as a juried program.  You are also welcome to publicize your program by whatever means you’d like, but please indicate that it is part of the “Grassroots Program Track.”

Handouts:

In an effort to create a “greener” conference and to keep expenses down, you are encouraged to utilize the conference wiki to upload program materials.

Program costs:

Each program will be allotted a $500 budget to cover speaker costs or other expenditures.  Cost of standard AV will be covered by ALA and is not part of the $500 budget allocation. To claim reimbursement, appropriate receipts must be submitted on an Expense Reimbursement Form .  Reimbursement requests must be received by ALA no later than August 15, 2009.  Requests received after that date will not be processed due to the closing of ALA’s fiscal year on August 31 and you will not be reimbursed.

Speaker costs:

ALA does not pay expenses or honoraria to librarians living in North America or ALA members who participate in Annual Conference programs. International speakers, as well as non-member, non-librarian speakers, are eligible for complimentary conference registrations.

Sample Programs:

To see a description of the programs presented at the 2008 Annual Conference, please refer to:  2008 Annual Conference Programs (PDF-6.61MB).

Questions:

Questions or comments regarding the Grassroots Program should be addressed to: 

Laura Horne

University of Richmond

lhorne@richmond.edu

PROCEED TO PROPOSAL FORM