Info for Presenters

We invite practitioners to share their ideas and experiences with fellow practitioners by submitting proposals for conference sessions. If you are thinking about doing a presentation at UPA International, IA Summit, IxDA, or CHI conferences, this is a good chance to practice and get some feedback on your presentation.

---

Submission Types

We are looking for the following types of submissions for the conference. If you have another idea for a session, please contact us. We invite you to be as hands-on as possible and use creative techniques for involving your audience.

30-minute presentations

• Present ideas and experiences related to usability methods, user experience design, user research or other relevant, emerging or unresolved issues.
• Talks should include time for questions or other interaction with the audience.
• The conference fee is waived for one presenter. Additional presenters will need to register and pay the registration fee.

30-minute panels

• 30-minute panels feature two or three people presenting their ideas and experiences on a common theme.
• Panels should include time for questions or other interaction with the audience.
• The conference fee is waived for one panel member. Additional panelists will need to register and pay the registration fee.

60-minute panels

• 60-minute panels feature three or four people presenting their ideas and experiences on a common theme.
• Panels should include time for questions or other interaction with the audience.
• The conference fee is waived for one panel member. Additional panelists will need to register and pay the registration fee.

Posters

• Posters present a case study, a project summary, or an interesting finding.
• They are a great opportunity to network and talk with other attendees about your projects.
• Students are also encouraged to present posters on practical subjects of interest to the professional community, since this is a good way for building up resumes and practicing your presentation skills.
• The conference fee is not waived for poster presenters.

---

Ideas for Topics

You are encouraged to suggest presentations on emerging trends, timeless topics, or just themes and patterns you’ve been noticing over the past year that have gotten you thinking in a new way or have inspired you to action. The list below contains a few ideas for general topics to help you get started. If you want feedback on an idea before you submit a proposal, email and the UPA DC Metro Chapter conference planning committee will provide quick feedback.

Methods for:

• Finding out what your users really need
• Facilitating design sessions
• Usability testing with remote users
• Measuring usability improvements
• Interpreting web usage statistics
• Making usability techniques more agile

Design:

• Case studies and success stories
• How to go from requirements and user data to design
• Organizing information for easy retrieval
• Communicating design
• Design of mobile applications, web applications, rich internet applications

Making usability work in your organization:

• Fitting usability into the product lifecycle
• Starting up a usability program in your organization
• Growing a usability team
• Return on Investment (ROI) for usability

---

Submission Procedures

All submissions were due by the end of the day on June 24 (midnight Eastern time).
Note: the call for presentation proposals is now closed.

Submitters were asked to provide the following information:

• Title of session
• Submission type (presentation, panel, or poster)
• Intended audience (new and/or experienced practitioners)
• Names, contact information, and short bios of presenters (indicate the primary presenter if more than one person will be presenting)
• Summary of your presentation (250-1000 words).
• For presentations and panels, describe how you will involve the audience (for example, questions/answers, hands-on exercises, interactive discussions, role-playing, demonstrations, etc.)
• Audio-visual support needed