Proposals, Papers, and Posters

We invite proposals for papers and poster presentations that provide examples of innovations in the scholarship of teaching and learning in the liberal arts context.

Proposals (unless they are larger than 250 KB) should be sent as an email attachment to cila@stolaf.edu. Please see below for how to send larger files.

Carnegie Foundation President Lee S. Shulman has written of what he describes as "pedagogical solitude," observing that "the result is that those who engage in innovative acts of teaching rarely build upon the work of others; nor can others build upon theirs." Building on Ernest Boyer's Scholarship Reconsidered, Shulman and many others have proposed a scholarship of teaching and learning that involves "problem posing about an issue of teaching or learning, study of the problem through methods appropriate to the disciplinary epistemologies, applications of results to practice, communication of results, self-reflection, and peer review."

This conference seeks to make public those innovations in teaching and learning that have been shown to be particularly appropriate for the liberal arts context.

Proposals of no more than 450 words are due by November 15, 2006, and should be submitted in Microsoft Word format, 12 pt. Times-New Roman, double-spaced. These should include (i) the author’s name, affiliation and email address, (ii) title, and (iii) statements of the paper’s goals, methodology, significance and results. Proposals should connect a particular innovation to the existing literature on teaching and learning, and we encourage those proposals that provide an assessment of the outcomes of the innovation for student learning.

Proposals may be for a paper or poster. We anticipate that all panels will be approximately 80 minutes in length and that each will have three presenters. Individuals submitting a paper should plan on about 20 minutes for its presentation, thus allowing about 20 minutes for questions and discussion. We strongly encourage all presenters not to read their papers. The poster session will be Saturday evening at the reception.

The conference organizers reserve the right to balance the program by inviting some individuals proposing papers to present their work as posters instead.

Papers and Posters

Completed papers and posters are due February 1, 2007. All papers and posters submitted by this deadline will be included in a CD of the conference proceedings.

Citations should follow the Chicago Manual of Style "Author-Date" system. Papers should be in Microsoft Word format, or as a PDF file.

All papers and posters must be submitted electronically to be included in the conference publication CD, and on the conference website. Our goal is to have a tangible record of each contribution to the conference. The CD will be distributed to conference participants and selected others (such as deans and directors of national organizations such as the Carnegie Foundation; authors will retain any copyright. We view this as "limited distribution" and we encourage conference participants to submit their work to journals and other publications. It would be appropriate to add a sentence to any such post-conference publication that reads "A version of this paper was first presented at the conference "Innovations in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning at Liberal Arts Colleges" held at St. Olaf and Carleton Colleges in February 2007." If you have any questions, please contact one of the conference organizers.

Papers should be sent as an email attachment to cila@stolaf.edu. Posters that are less than 3 MB may also be submitted as attachments; large format posters or papers that involve file sizes greater than 3 MB should be sent electronically as a PDF file to the conference ftp site. Please see below for more information about sending large files.

Suggestions for those preparing posters for the conference:

• Poster Tips

• Poster Guidelines

• Creating and Printing Large Posters

• Submitting Large Files

Easels will be provided for all poster presenters. Sheets of posterboard 32 " by 40 " will be available at the conference, as will small binder clips for attaching sheets to the posterboard. We encourage those planning to print large format posters to see the suggestions above, and to contact their respective IT departments.

Important dates:

November 15, 2006: Deadline for proposals for papers and posters

November 30, 2006: Notification of accepted papers and posters

January 8, 2007: Early Bird deadline for registration ($160)

January 15, 2007: Deadline for release of local accomodation that has been held for conference participants.

February 8, 2007: Registration deadline ($190)

February 1, 2007: Deadline for submission of completed papers and posters