2025 GCC Annual Conference Call for Proposals Submission
The 2025 GCC Conference Committee invites members to submit proposals for the in-person annual conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota on June 10-13, 2025. The theme for this year’s conference is Flowing Forward: Navigating Currents of Change.
About the Theme
This dynamic conference celebrates the positive impact of our work with graduate students, postdocs, faculty, and campus stakeholders, highlighting our shared commitment to evolving within academia’s changing landscape. The conference offers a platform to showcase innovative programs, resources, and collaborations that address the needs of our community and those we serve. Hosted in the “City of Lakes” Minneapolis, we invite attendees to "flow forward" by embracing change and growing together. Please join us for an enriching experience designed to spark your curiosity, expand your skills, and inspire your next steps with renewed purpose and identity.
We are excited to see proposals that span the diverse spectrum of work performed by GCC members, including proposals that focus on us as practitioners. In particular, we invite proposals that:
- Showcase innovative programming designed to meet the evolving needs of students, trainees, employers, career & professional development professionals (ourselves) and other constituents
- Focus on the creative and expanding use of technologies in our work
- Address how reflective and iterative practices help navigate challenges and build resilience
- Adapt proactive and forward-thinking strategies to changing practices in both graduate education and the world of work
- Demonstrate the use of data and research to design, evaluate, and improve our programs, practices, and policies
- Highlight other relevant topics that advance our collective mission and impact
The deadline for proposals is March 4th, 2025 at 5:00pm EST. The GCC will notify members of accepted proposals by the end of March 2025.
Session Formats
For this in-person conference, we are excited to receive proposals for 1) deep dives, 2) interactive sessions, 3) lightning talks, and 4) posters/table-top demonstrations for the Presentation Showcase session. We encourage you to consider each of the session types below as you think about which will best facilitate the delivery of your content.
1. Deep dives
Deep dives are 50-min sessions that offer a comprehensive perspective into an initiative(s), program, or resource. They can be delivered individually or by a team of presenters from the same or different institutions. These information-rich sessions give audience members a substantive understanding of the topic. These sessions should be 40 min in length with 10 min for questions. Handouts, virtual handouts, or links to additional sources of relevant information can be shared with participants during these sessions to support the delivered content.
2. Interactive and how-to sessions
Interactive and how-to sessions are 50-min sessions that are an opportunity to share practical initiatives, programs, or tools, or to pose a question/challenge, followed by an interactive or experiential component. They can be delivered individually or by a team of presenters from the same or different institutions. In general terms, these sessions consist of a 15- to 20-min talk and 30- to 35-min experiential discussion and/or activity. These sessions make use of active learning approaches and technology to promote the continuous learning of powerful teaching or professional practices, resources, and tools. Presenters are encouraged to think about which active learning approaches will best support the topics being delivered beyond just pair-share discussions.
3. Lightning talks
Lightning talks are 8-10 minute presentations that are grouped together within a 50-minute session. They offer presenters a wonderful opportunity to share early-stage ideas, updates on programs and initiatives, and research briefs as part of a dynamic, fast-paced, information rich session. Lightning talks also offer new members who do not want to lead a full 50-minute session the opportunity to build confidence in their presentation styles. Presenters selected for Lightning talks will also be given the option to expand on their topic in the Presentation Showcase session if they want to do so.
4. Presentation showcase
The Presentation Showcase provides a dynamic mix of posters, interactive talks, discussions, and demonstrations. For this session, GCC members can submit ideas for traditional posters, digital displays (e.g., videos, animations, online tools), tabletop displays, or demonstrations that explore specific tools or technologies. Presentation types/displays will need to fit on a poster board or tabletop, but provide a wonderful opportunity for presenters to showcase exciting and innovative ideas, programs, tools, achievements, and successes in their work.
Proposal Evaluation
We will evaluate proposals and select those strong in:
- Alignment to the theme and one of the target topics.
- The scalability and relevance of the topic to differently sized and resourced institutions
- Clarity of session outcomes
- Evidence of impact and innovation
- Equitable, inclusive, and accessible design and practices. Consider referencing the GCC Resource Guide for Inclusive, Equitable, and Accessible Programming: https://sites.google.com/view/gcc-resource-guide/home
- Level of interaction and engagement (applicable to Interactive and How-to Sessions only)
Please review the evaluation rubric below before submitting a proposal to get a sense of how the Member Generated Sessions Subcommittee will evaluate your proposal. Evaluation Rubric: http://tinyurl.com/GCC2024proposalrubric.
Other Considerations
First-Time Presenters
We welcome first-time presenters, and especially encourage you to consider presenting a lightning talk or as part of the Presentation Showcase as a great way to gain experience presenting in a conference setting. The Member-Generated Sessions Sub-Committee can share a list of presenters from last year with you if you want to network with them to help you learn more about the submission process, creating a session, and what to expect during the session.
Multiple Proposal Submissions
As the GCC community continues to grow, we often receive more proposals than we can accommodate. As you brainstorm your proposal and/or connect with colleagues to discuss collaborative proposals, please be mindful that spots are limited and consider submitting only one proposal as the primary presenter across session formats #1-3 listed above. You are welcome to submit an additional proposal for the presentation showcase. Our goal with the member-generated sessions is to showcase a breadth of institutions, members, and topics.
Non-GCC Members
Priority will be given to proposals where all presenters are current GCC members. However, if your proposal includes a co-presenter who is not a GCC member, the co-presenter must register as a guest speaker and pay to attend the conference.
If you have questions or concerns about the proposal submission process, please email conference@gradcareerconsortium.org.
If you are filling out this form for the first time, please click the New Submission button on the left.
If you are returning to edit or complete a previous submission, please fill out the email address and access code you set up previously and click Edit Submission.