2026 OWCA Conference Call for Proposals

OWCA Conference 2026

Writing Centers as Sites of Solidarity

April 9-10, 2026

The Online Writing Centers Association invites proposals for its fifth virtual conference. We encourage all writing center folk to participate, including writing center professionals, graduate students, and undergraduates. 

Deadlines and Conference Timeline

  • Proposals Due – November 19, 2025
  • Acceptances – January 4, 2026
  • Conference Materials Due – March 2, 2026
  • Synchronous Conference Sessions – April 9 – 10, 2026

Call for Proposals

Dearest humans,

We write to you from writing centers not too different from your own. We write to you amidst what can only be described as divided times. We write to you with scattered feelings, unknown budgets, and carefully chosen words. We write to you as fellow humans still learning how to navigate the changing academic, social, and political landscapes.

In 1983, Benedict Anderson contributed interdisciplinary, foundational work with Imagined Communities. In this text, he introduced the idea that our national community is imagined since we will never know many of our neighbors but may still feel a common ideology linking us together. The Writing Center community is kind of imagined too. It would be a difficult task to know everyone. And yet, the Online Writing Centers Association exists to bridge our writing centers and knowledges together so that we can learn from and support one another. These bridges are not always built on consensus: counterstory (Martinez, 2016, 2020; Faison & Condon, 2022) and rhetorical listening (Ratcliffe, 2005; Murray Costello, 2018) ask us to embrace difference, tension, and even friction as productive spaces for learning and solidarity. Further, frameworks like collective impact (Kania & Kramer, 2011) and the snowflake model of community engagement (Ganz, n.d.) suggest that collaboration thrives not through sameness but through the strength of varied, interconnected nodes. This year we invite you to walk across metaphorical bridges that link our centers together and practice solidarity with fellow writing center humans. 

We are connected in many ways, most obviously by our diverse writing center roles. This past year has been a bit of a wild ride—for some more than others. Whatever one’s feelings or beliefs, there is dissensus in the world: disagreements, disruptions, and dissonances that can nevertheless open space for connection and solidarity. Our conference theme allows us to consider what it means to be in solidarity with others who open their arms with compassion as well as those who confront us with challenges. Dissensus in collaboration is not a new development, and perhaps we can lean on our familiarities to navigate these new difficulties. As such, we invite you to consider how dissensus can be productive in writing center sessions. These guiding questions are here to inspire (and not limit) you: How can we support tutor training to better prepare peer tutors for sessions that may seem difficult? How can writing center administration work creatively to manage academia’s current and upcoming challenges? How can we foster solidarity with writing center folks who may not have support on their campuses? 

The OWCA 2026 Conference: Writing Centers as Sites of Solidarity will return to its multi-day schedule consisting of both synchronous and asynchronous presentations. 

Areas to Consider

Proposals for this theme may consider, but are not limited to, the following areas:

  • Administration: Budgeting, institutional support, the writing center’s parent department, partnering with campus resources, etc.
  • Writing Center Staff: Employment, contingency roles, staff professional development, graduate student professionalization, tutor hiring and training, emotional labor, etc.
  • Student Populations: Overall enrollment, graduate v. undergraduate, STEM writing, multilingual writers, etc.
  • Community & Belonging: culture, accessibility, access, creative work-arounds, community engagement, dialogic exchange, dignity in the writing center, multilingual learners, underrepresented groups, learner-centered support, etc.
  • Questions of Value: Misconceptions of the writing center, skills transfer, the writing center and other academic support resources, student retention, writing center assessments, etc.
  • The 21st Century: AI (ChatGPT, Grammarly, etc.), multimodality, online v. in-person tutoring, synchronous v. asynchronous tutoring, pandemics and other major national or global events/crises, etc.
  • Online Writing Centers: Administration, technology, barriers, populations served, synchronous v. asynchronous tutoring, etc.

Session Formats

The OWCA accepts proposals for the following session formats:

Asynchronous Formats

Asynchronous presenters will pre-record a presentation that will be available to attendees the week of the conference from April 6-10, 2026. After this date, presenters can choose for their recording to be deleted from the OWCA website or to be moved to our public scholarship database and/or members-only conference archive.

Asynchronous presentations should be a maximum of 10 minutes in length. These sessions are ideal for:

  • Presenting research that explores a specific topic, question, or collected data.
  • Showcasing a particular technology or program helpful to writing center work.
  • Outlining a technique or approach used in your writing center.

All asynchronous presenters will also be offered the opportunity to share or discuss their work live during the conference on April 9-10, 2026. 

Synchronous Formats

Synchronous sessions highlight participation through interactive conversations or activities that provide explicit opportunities for attendees to discuss, share, and/or create. Synchronous sessions can be in one of the following formats:

  • General Workshop: An interactive session that briefly introduces a topic, then invites participation in activities to apply concepts or develop new materials. 
    • Recommended duration: 75 or 90 minutes
  • Roundtable Discussion: A collaborative conversation in which attendees are led by a moderator, guiding the discussion through specific questions or prompts.
    • Recommended duration: 50 or 75 minutes.
  • Research Networking: A session that allows participants to share works-in-progress, create connections for collaboration, or seek feedback on current research projects.
    • Recommended duration: 50 or 75 minutes
  • Professionalization Forums: An opportunity to present best practices in professional skills (job applications, interviewing, etc.) or to provide advice to those entering the writing center job market. 
    • Recommended duration: 50 or 75 minutes

Synchronous sessions will run for 50, 75, or 90 minutes on April 9-10, 2026. Presentations will be recorded (unless otherwise directed by the presenters). After the conference, presenters can choose for their captioned recording to be deleted from the OWCA website or to be moved to our public scholarship database and/or members-only conference archive.

Accessibility

The OWCA requires presenters and facilitators to share accessible materials for their session prior to the actual conference dates. These materials are necessary to fulfill OWCA’s commitment to accessible, equitable, and inclusive interaction. The OWCA reserves the right to edit presentation materials for digital accessibility.

Asynchronous presenters will need to share the following materials:

  • Slide decks or other materials used in the recording by March 2, 2026. Presenters who are using slide decks must provide the slides as a PowerPoint (PPT) file. Other files should be shared as Microsoft Word documents. These files will be available to attendees.
  • Session recording and closed captions by March 2, 2026. Presenters who propose an asynchronous presentation will record their presentation and upload it to YouTube. We recommend setting your video privacy setting to “unlisted” and turning off comments and ratings. Presenters will be asked to edit the closed captions on their video for accuracy before sending the YouTube link to the OWCA. For assistance, use these resources on How to make a YouTube video unlisted and How to add closed captions in YouTube.
  • Handouts [if applicable] by March 2, 2026. Presenters who plan to share handouts must provide these files as Microsoft Word documents to the OWCA.

Synchronous facilitators will need to share the following materials by March 2, 2026:

  • Detailed outline: Facilitators should prepare a detailed outline that includes any scripted portions of the session, outlines the major topics and the order of activities, and includes directions for any activity and/or the specific discussion questions being put forward. 
  • Slide decks [if applicable]: Facilitators who are using slide decks must provide the slides as a PowerPoint (PPT) file to the OWCA to be available to attendees.
  • Handouts [if applicable]: Facilitators who plan to distribute handouts must provide these files as Microsoft Word documents to the OWCA. We recommend a handout if you plan to utilize Zoom breakout rooms to support smaller group conversations. 

In order to support presenters and facilitators in developing accessible materials, the OWCA will provide the following:

  • A pop-up event on making your conference materials accessible will be offered in early March (co-hosted by OWCA’s Accessibility and Virtual Events Committees).
  • Training materials, guides, and support to help presenters develop accessible presentation materials. Please visit OWCA’s Accessibility Resources page.
  • American Sign Language (ASL) interpreters in all synchronous sessions. The OWCA works with Interpretek for ASL interpretation.
  • Recordings of all synchronous sessions and their ASL interpretation
  • Edited closed captions for all synchronous video recordings.

If you plan to present or attend and we have not appropriately planned for your accessibility needs, please email the OWCA Accessibility Committee at access@onlinewritingcenters.org.

 

Registration

An OWCA membership is required to present and/or attend OWCA 2026 as well as to access conference materials. One-year OWCA memberships are $5-15 for students and $40 for professionals. Learn more about OWCA membership dues and benefits. 

 

Submit a Proposal

Conference proposals are due on November 19, 2025. After initial review of proposals, there will be an opportunity to revise and resubmit the proposal based on feedback from the conference committee. Submissions must include the following:

  • All presenter name(s), role(s), institution(s), and email(s)
  • Working title
  • Session format and the reasoning for this particular format
  • Topic category or categories 
  • An abstract in written (about 500 words) or audio/video (5 minutes or less) format


Learn more about submitting your proposal on OWCA’s Conference page or jump directly to the OWCA Conference 2026 Proposal Submission form.

 

Proposal Scoring Rubric

Conference proposals will be scored using the following rubric:

  • Is the focus of the proposal clear and innovative? (scale of 1-4)
    • 1 = unclear topic; replicates previous contributions
    • 4 = clear topic; proposes new idea; draws new connections or conclusions
  • Would this proposal contribute to varied perspectives and interpretations of the
    conference theme and writing center work? (scale of 1-4)
    • 1 = irrelevant to writing centers; irrelevant to the conference theme
    • 4 = exceptionally meaningful to writing centers; compellingly responds to
      conference theme
  • Is the proposal already situated in an existing body of research or does the
    proposal have the potential to be situated in an existing body of research?
    • Yes _______
    • Somewhat _________
    • No ___________
  • Does the proposal address diversity/inclusivity and/or offer a perspective from an
    underrepresented group or institution?
    • Yes _______
    • Somewhat _________
    • No ___________
  • For synchronous sessions only: Does the proposed session provide opportunity
    for active participation of attendees?
    • Yes _______
    • Somewhat _________
    • No ___________
  •  Would you recommend we accept the proposal?
    • Yes
    • Invite to revise and resubmit
    • No