Timing

The Workshop Coordinator should contact AMICAL Administration as early as possible in the development of their plans, to ensure that the project is aligned with review criteria and to get feedback on the shaping of the proposal.

Event dates

Two categories of event timing are possible: during the AMICAL Conference, or outside the AMICAL Conference.

For workshop topics with an audience that clearly overlaps with one or more groups in the expected attendee profiles for the AMICAL Conference, timing the workshop jointly with the Conference is highly preferable. The largest groups of expected Conference attendees include librarians (especially with roles in management, instruction, or digital initiatives), instructional designers and instructional technologists, and faculty (disciplinary or with a faculty development role) engaged in collaboration with librarians and technologists.

For workshops with an audience that is more specialized, with limited overlap with the expected Conference attendee profiles, an event date outside of the Conference is preferable. In this case, events should be scheduled for periods that will not conflict with other planned AMICAL events. Not all events under development are listed on the AMICAL events page, so be sure to check with AMICAL Administration for advice on avoiding date conflicts with other events or with AMICAL members’ academic and holiday calendars.

Proposal deadlines

Face-to-face events: end of August, for events planned for September through August. If you are proposing a workshop to run jointly with the AMICAL Conference, send the proposal as early as you can.

Online events: Proposals may be submitted throughout the year, according to the same deadlines as those listed for Small Grants.

Proposal structure

The Workshop Coordinator should duplicate the proposal form Google Doc to submit a brief proposal of roughly 500-1000 words, including the following elements:

• Grant title
• Workshop Coordinator
• Committee endorsement
• Proposed event date
• Audience
• Background and context
• Expected budget
• Overview

See the proposal form for details.

If accepted: Detailed workshop information for event confirmation

If your proposal is accepted, you will need to provide more detailed information in the following areas before AMICAL Administration can confirm that the event can be funded and scheduled (some of this may be provided by the workshop instructors):

• Organizing team
• Background and context
• Proposed activity
• Expected outcomes
• Budget

See the proposal form for details.

How to submit the proposal

• Submit the proposal by email to contact@amicalnet.org, copying your institution’s AMICAL representative and the committee chair that has endorsed your proposal.
• Attach the proposal as a separate document (a PDF, DOC/DOCX, or ODT file)
• Any supporting information should be attached included in the attached document or added as another attachment.
• OPTIONAL: To facilitate the review of the proposal, include a link to a Google doc version of the same proposal. The text of the Google doc should be equivalent to that in the attached file you send.

Review process & criteria

Proposals are reviewed and approved by:

• the AMICAL Director, in consultation with the Chair of the Coordinating Committee, for smaller budgets (up to €1000)
• the Grant Review Committee, composed of the voting members of the Coordinating Committee, for larger budgets (more than €1000)

The Review Committee considers and rates proposals using the same criteria applied to Small Grant applications. The criteria that apply to Workshop Grants are those under “For all applications” and “Professional Development”. Language in the criteria referring to “the applicant” can be considered as applying to the anticipated workshop participants, whose profiles should be described in the proposal under “Audience”.

The Review Committee may call on a standing committee chair to provide an expert opinion on proposals related to a committee’s work. The chair may in turn seek input from their committee members if necessary.

Revision

In cases where a proposal is potentially fundable but falls short for certain criteria, a revision of the proposal may be requested; in such cases, the Review Committee (or the committee consulted) will try to provide feedback on how to improve the proposal.

Notification of decision

Depending on the timing and scale of the proposal, the Review Committee will provide a response to the applicant within 1-4 weeks following submission.