Refresh your career at GWS2005!
We invite you to join us next March in Philadelphia for “People, Places, and Parks: Preservation for Future Generations” — a week of reflection, reconnection, and renewal in the birthplace of the United States. Against the incomparable historic backdrop of Philadelphia, professionals from every field in natural and cultural resources will gather for America’s premier interdisciplinary meeting on parks, other kinds of protected areas, and cultural sites.
GWS2005 is your chance to catch up with old colleagues, make important new contacts, get up-to-date on the latest innovations in park management, and stay current with research findings in your field. With our broad range of program offerings — including thought-provoking keynotes, paper and panel presentations, affinity meetings, and on-site and field-based workshops — GWS2005 aims to be the park profession’s best training value. If parks, protected areas, and cultural sites are important to you, GWS2005 is the place to come to get intellectually refreshed.
For more than twenty years the George Wright Society has hosted these biennial meetings, in concert with our long-time co-sponsors, the National Park Service and U.S. Geological Survey, and supporter, Eastern National. Mark your calendars and make plans to spend a productive week at GWS2005. The benefits will last long after you’ve returned home.
Proposals are being accepted through October 8, 2004. Read on for more information.
Focus areas for the program
The GWS conference program is keyed to four broad focus areas. We encourage proposals in all of these areas, and suggest some possible questions or topics that fit under each one. (These lists are for purposes of illustration; they are not exhaustive and many other topics are possible.)
FOCUS AREA: Science, Scholarship, and Understanding
Conference sessions in this area focus on the use of scientific research to enhance our understanding and management of protected natural areas; on the use of scholarship in the humanities to enhance our understanding and management of cultural sites and cultural heritage in general; on the use of social sciences to understand park visitors and the sociopolitical background against which parks operate; and on techniques for making sure science and scholarship are delivered to front-line managers in a form they can use in their daily work.
Possible topics:
- How do we expand our inventories of cultural properties to represent the broad array of cultures that make up our communities? How do we effectively inventory the biodiversity of parks and protected natural areas?
- How do we convey the importance of research to helping address the increasingly complex threats faced by parks and other protected areas?
- How do we ensure that our research is current and meets professional standards of excellence?
- For natural resources, how do we ensure that good science is delivered from (and to) parks? For cultural resources, how do we ensure that our research is conducted in collaboration with the cultures we seek to understand?
- What kind of information do we need to fully understand visitors and their reasons for coming to parks and cultual sites?
- How do we expand CESUs, Research Learning Centers, and other partnerships with the academic community to fully support research in the “hard” sciences, humanities, and social sciences?
- How do we encourage a more culturally diverse corps of researchers?
- How do we identify those key indicators that reveal the condition of cultural properties? How do we establish baselines for and changes in ecosystem health and ecological integrity? How do we use this information to help assure the long-term sustainability of parks and cultural sites?
FOCUS AREA: Preservation and Management
Conference sessions in this area focus on the practice of managing parks, protected areas, and cultural sites. Emphases include hands-on methods for getting the job done, programmatic and regulatory matters that affect park management, and leading-edge developments in preservation technology and techniques.
Possible topics:
- What techniques can managers use to sift through information to find that which is most relevant? To decide which information to credit when experts disagree?
- How do we create a toolbox of techniques and technologies to support preservation and management? What are the latest innovations: in non-invasive testing and monitoring, in visitor use analysis, in architectural and curatorial conservation, in the use of genetics, in sustainable design?
- How will we decide what to do when natural and cultural resource values are in conflict?
- Does NPS have a visitor capacity problem ... or a general management planning problem?
- GMOs in parks: are we ready?
- Commemorating 9/11: the role of professional perspective in an emotional process
- Ecological restoration in protected areas: how do you decide what is natural?
- Climate change and park ecosystems: is there anything we can do?
FOCUS AREA: Environmental Justice / Civic Engagement
Conference sessions in this area focus on issues of equity as they relate to the use, understanding, and enjoyment of parks and cultural sites by people from diverse racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds. “Civic engagement” refers to active attempts by parks and museums to engage the public on controversial topics in order to foster the kind of informed discussion that is critical to the functioning of multicultural, democratic society.
Possible topics:
- Moving towards equity: Are we there yet?
- Meeting the challenges of environmental justice: What? So what? Now what?
- Environmental justice and the political climate
- Better safe than sorry: understanding environmental justice
- What are the untold stories in the parks and why are these stories not being told?
- Are we paying attention to how resources are viewed through the eyes of the youth?
- What do parks mean to different people? Different cultures?
- What is the meaning of urban green space versus the national park concept?
- What messages could be sent to help bridge the gap between perceptions of urban and rural environments?
- How do parks deal with the very concept of justice?
- What are the roles of parks, protected areas, and cultural sites in promoting relevancy of these areas to diverse users?
- How are park managers and staff standing up for justice, anti-racism, and inclusion?
- What are the best practices for parks to meet the desires of people of diverse cultures?
- What are the injustices inherent in how we do business?
- How do we include the heritage of groups that have been under-represented in the “canon” of history?
FOCUS AREA: Education / Appreciation
Conference sessions in this area focus on the educational functions of parks, protected areas, and cultural sites. Emphases include park interpretive programs, the interface of parks with schools and institutions of higher learning, the principles and practices of building appreciation for park resources among the general public, and training needs for park professionals.
Possible topics:
- How do we create a toolbox of techniques and technologies that park interpreters and educators outside parks can use to explain complicated resource issues?
- What are the promises and pitfalls of techniques such as long-distance learning and Web-based learning?
- What are the ways in which preserving and enjoying our national heritage can be supported through education at all levels (K-12, higher education, and adult continuing education)?
- How do we communicate the value of heritage research and protection to the average person?
- What must be done to provide the training and professional support needed to sustain a comprehensive program of cultural and natural heritage protection?
- How do we engage the tourism and recreation industries so that visitors to parks, cultural and historic sites, and museums take home an appreciation of the value of our diverse heritage?
- What is the role of public agencies in “shaping the nation’s conscience” with regard to interpreting national history, or protecting the environment, or promoting certain forms of recreation?
- With agency budgets in seemingly perpetual decline, what are the cost-effective ways to give people the professional in-service training they need?
The conference format in brief
- Plenary Sessions, in which all attendees come together to consider issues related to the theme of the conference. Plenary speakers are notable in their field.
- Concurrent Sessions, with as many as nine running simultaneously, each lasting two hours. Concurrent sessions can take a range of formats, including paper presentations, and more audience-interactive formats such as panel discussions, debates, etc. You can propose to organize an entire session, or else submit a proposal for a paper to be assigned to a session.
- New! “Day-Capper” Sessions—a better way to cap off your day. In response to numerous suggestions from previous attendees, this year we are trying something different to minimize late-afternoon burnout. Instead of a standard block of 2-hour concurrent sessions running from 4:00–6:00 pm, we will be offering “Day-Capper” Sessions: lively, innovative, and fun sessions with a more informal setting. Day-Cappers will run from 4:00–5:15 pm. We are encouraging people to use these shorter sessions to tackle topics that are cutting-edge ... controversial ... maybe even slightly off-the-wall! You can propose a Day-Capper that is structured around a single presentation (or two), or a panel discussion — but the key is to make sure there is plenty of time for audience participation. Toward that end, we encourage Day-Cappers to be “Powerpoint-Free Zones” — if all else fails, put the chairs in a circle and establish eye contact! (Or at least keep Powerpoints to a minimum.) We are looking for creative people who have creative ways of exploring important issues, and who relish getting the audience involved. If that person is you, put in a proposal to organize a Day-Capper! (Some ideas to get you going.)
- Workshops, small-group working meetings open to all conference registrants on a first-come, first-served basis. (In addition, some Mobile Workshops — to be held at locations other than the conference hotel — will be organized by the Conference Committee.)
- Side Meetings, small-group programmatic, business, or affinity meetings. Some side meetings are open to all conference registrants; others are by invitation only.
- A Poster / Computer Demo Session, which runs continuously from Monday morning through Tuesday afternoon of the conference week.
- Exhibits, premanufactured displays that are available for viewing during the entire conference week.
- Field Trips, learning experiences integrated into the conference. Wednesday of the conference week is set aside for them. An additional fee is required.
- Special Events such as a welcoming reception, silent auction, evening discussions, joint GWS/NPS awards event, etc. For some events an additional fee is required.
How the program is put together
The conference is organized by a Conference Committee convened by the George Wright Society. The Committee chooses the overall conference theme, organizes plenary sessions around that theme, and issues the Call for Proposals you are reading now. The Committee then evaluates abstracts received in response to the Call for Proposals, selecting a portion of them to make up the conference program.
Putting together the concurrent session line-up is the biggest challenge in setting up the conference program. The Committee typically must sift through several hundred abstracts, crafting concurrent sessions from individual oral paper proposals (and finding someone to chair those sessions) while also evaluating proposals to organize concurrent sessions, side meetings, workshops, etc.
In selecting proposals, the Committee looks at several factors:
- The quality of the abstract, in terms of both content and presentation.
- The goal of including a mix of cultural and natural resource interests in the overall conference program. Particular attention is given to topics that cut across cultural and natural resource interests.
- The goal of representing a range of protected area agencies and philosophies in the overall conference program.
- The need to make concurrent sessions internally coherent.
Competition for places on the program can be keen. To facilitate the participation of as many people as possible, the Conference Committee asks that individuals propose to take part in no more than three sessions in any capacity as a presenter (whether as lead author, junior author, session organizer, session panelist, etc.).
How to submit a proposal
We welcome proposals for concurrent sessions, Day-Cappers, workshops, side meetings, individual papers for assignment to concurrent sessions, posters, computer demos, and exhibits. Abstracts are welcome on any topic related to research, management, and education in parks, protected areas, and cultural sites. The deadline for proposals is October 8, 2004. Submitting an abstract (150-word maximum) is an easy two-step process. Click here to get started.
Interested in Chairing a Session?
We are always looking for volunteers willing to chair concurrent sessions that have been put together from the abstracts received in response to this Call for Proposals. Session chairs are responsible for: (1) touching base with the presenters in their session before the conference (the George Wright Society coordinates this); and (2) seeing that individual presentations run in on time and in an orderly fashion; and (3) coordinating the Q&A period at the end of each presentation. It’s a great way to meet new colleagues! If you are interested, please check the box on the on-line abstract submission form and fill in your area(s) of interest/expertise in the space provided.
A proceedings book containing papers from the conference will be published. The proceedings will be available as a paperback and on CD. All full-week and two-day registrants will receive the proceedings as part of their registration fee. Click here for more information and authors’ instructions.
Questions?
Contact us — we’ll be glad to help you!
The George Wright Society
P.O. Box 65
Hancock, Michigan 49930-0065 USA
1-906-487-9722; fax 1-906-487-9405
conferences@georgewright.org
