A pro tip for what to do with rejected conference proposals

Suzanne Kaplan-Fonseca presenting at the NYS TESOL Conference in 2018.

Suzanne Kaplan-Fonseca is following up on our recent post about how to write a conference proposal with a bonus tip.

If your proposal was rejected, and there is an opportunity to ask why it was rejected – do. Sometimes you can gather this information from the rubric if it is returned to you.

I was denied the very first time I applied to present at a conference - an annual one at The New School. I emailed the woman who had sent me the unhappy news of the rejection, asking if we might meet to discuss the proposal so I could learn what to do better next time. Then-director of the MA TESOL program, Lesley Painter-Farrell, generously invited me in for a meeting – it was our first time to meet – and guess what? The proposal had been rejected over a word choice issue! In my proposal, I described the series of lessons about which I was going to present as “a unit.” Doing so made the proposal reviewers think I was trying to market a textbook through my presentation. This was not the case at all; I was proposing to present “a series of related lessons,” which I thought of as “a unit.” As a result of this meeting, Lesley invited me to give a poster presentation at the conference that year, and I have gone on to present at many subsequent conferences - regional, national, and international – successfully. That rejection launched my career as a presenter!