MAC members,

As your Vice Head/Programming Chair, I am excited to see the discussion
about ideas for our upcoming annual conference in Washington, DC.

We'll be posting a lot over the next few weeks and months about the
activities that will be happening during the conference.

But,  I wanted to directly address the question about proposing
panels/sessions in the Spring semester (i.e. closer to the April 1st paper
deadline)

I am one of the biggest proponents that we leave room for "breaking news"
type of topics to be included on the program.    AEJMC has historically
reserved one or two slots for "Hot Topics" panels or sessions that can be
organized in the final weeks of the convention planning cycle.

(You may recall that I organized a roundtable in 2015 at our San Francisco
Conference in the wake of the Charleston Shootings that occurred in June)

With nearly 20 AEJMC Divisions, Interest Groups and Commissions, and ONE
convention hotel,  the association has to utilize a very long planning
window for a very complicated process.    Most convention sessions that are
not refereed research paper sessions are co-sponsored by at least two (2)
units.    Those programming "slots" have already been allocated and
panelists finalized.

Our programming copy for panels has already been submitted and is now in
the editing stage.

This allows us to focus primarily on the refereed research papers that are
going into the review stage now that the April 1st submission deadline has
past.

Toronto is coming!   That's our 2019 conference and our incoming vice head
will be looking for ideas at our conference this summer.  Let's begin
building that list for next year.

In the meantime, we'll keep our ears and eyes open for a HOT TOPICS
sessions that we may be able to convince AEJMC leadership to add early
summer should the need arise.

I am copying our AEJMC Council of Divisions Head Heloiza Herscovitz to this
conversation as I'm sure she would add more to our understanding on how the
convention program comes together.   The process is managed by the Council
of Divisions.

-- 
George L. Daniels, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Journalism and Creative Media
The University of Alabama
Box 870172
Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0172