To shape a high-quality learning experience for all attendees, the ACPA25 Program Team needs a diverse team of reviewers from all functional areas of higher education, tertiary education, and student affairs and services. Representation is needed from all career levels, including graduate and entry-level, mid-level, senior-level professionals, and faculty. ACPA members of Color, transgender, non-binary, and gender non-conforming members, women, disabled members, and members with additional minoritized or silenced identities are encouraged to participate as program proposal reviewers.

As a reviewer, you provide feedback to individuals submitting proposals, learn more about best practices and initiatives in higher education, and gain professional development experience in evaluating proposals.

When you apply to serve as a reviewer, you indicate the types of sessions and topic areas you feel qualified to review given your experiences and knowledge/skill level in each of the ACPA/NASPA Professional Competencies for Student Affairs Educators. It is our goal to match you with proposals that align with your indicated knowledge/skills. The Program team will provide you with a variety of resources and tools to guide your reviews, ensuring that you have full support along the way. 

What is expected of Convention Program Reviewers?

• Participate in a virtual asynchronous Reviewer Training to ensure understanding of evaluation tools and the review process.

• Be available to evaluate and review programs from 12 August – 6 September 2024.

• Review 5-10 proposals, depending on the volume of submissions (or more, if you are willing).

• Use Education Session and/or Scholarship Program Reviewer Rubrics to review all assigned proposals ethically and consistently.

• Consider how the proposal connects to the ACPA/NASPA Professional Competencies, the ACPA25 vision (Take a breath…Begin again.), and to relevant contextual and/or theoretical perspectives.

• Evaluate how proposals incorporate ACPA’s values and vision statements, including the Strategic Imperative for Racial Justice and Decolonization. 

• Provide constructive, thoughtful, equitable, and inclusive feedback to the coordinating presenter(s).

Program Review Timeline

• 15 July: Reviewer Training materials available on the ACPA24 website

• 2 August: Deadline to sign up to be a Reviewer

• 12 August: Receive email with assigned programs to review

• 12 August – 6 September: Review assigned proposals

• 6 September: Proposal reviews due

Reviewer Training Materials

ACPA25 Peer Review Slideshow

ACPA25 Reviewer Training Video

Recognizing and Accounting for Bias

Just as we bring a variety of personal and professional experiences into our daily work, we bring those same experiences and background into the review of programs for the Annual Convention. As program reviewers committed to building a Convention centering attendees’ experience, focusing on skill and knowledge development as professionals, and advancing our collective work towards Racial Justice and Decolonization, recognizing and accounting for our own biases born from those experiences and backgrounds helps us critically construct a program slate that honors the diverse perspectives and voices strengthening our field. 

Reviewing from a Decolonizing Lens

The different ways of knowing/being in/understanding the world is never more apparent than at Convention. When reviewing Convention Program Proposals, it is critical that we consider the application of these different ways of knowing/being in/understanding the world to the work of Higher Education Professionals to enrich the learning, developmental, and collegial opportunities that define Convention as premier professional development for the field.

Initially framing the process of Reviewing from a Decolonizing Lens, ACPA’s A Bold Vision Forward: A Framework for the Strategic Imperative for Racial Justice and Decolonization provides some context around critically questioning the knowledge we use:

“In addition to thoughtful consideration of language in our written and spoken word, as student affairs educators, in and out of the classroom, we must critically consider the knowledges we use in practice and research and the paradigms on which our assumptions for both activities are based. One example of questioning the knowledges we use is based in the historical context of colonialism…Another way to question the knowledges we use is through citational audits and review of research practices found in the literature.”

Dr. Leigh Patel, in her seminal work No Study Without Struggle: Confronting Settler Colonialism in Higher Education, shares with us that

“Narratives don’t just tell a story; they structure material realities…Despite so many facts to contrary, her [mother’s] story is testimony to the power of pervasive narratives that materially shape peoples’ lives and life pathways. These narratives hold tremendous power even when they don’t have a basis in reality but rather in the specter of domination.” (2021, p. 104)

Universal Design

Universal Design is an important tool to ensure equitable participation and learning in Convention Programs. Reviewers are encouraged to consider how the program proposals they are reviewing are reflective of the Principles of Universal Design, compiled by advocates of Universal Design in 1997 at the Center for Universal Design (located at NC State University):

1. Equitable Use: The design of the program does not disadvantage or stigmatize any group of users.

2. Flexibility in Use: The design of the program accommodates a wide range of individual preferences and abilities.

3. Simple, Intuitive Use: Use of the design is easy to understand, regardless of the user’s experience, knowledge, language skills, or current concentration level.

4. Perceptible Information: The design of the program communicates necessary information effectively to the user, regardless of ambient conditions or the user’s sensory abilities.

5. Tolerance for Error: The design of the program minimizes hazards and the adverse consequences of accidental or unintended actions.

6. Low Physical Effort: The design of the program can be used efficiently and comfortably, and with a minimum of fatigue.

7. Size and Space for Approach & Use: Appropriate size and space is considered in the proposal for approach, reach, manipulation, and use, regardless of the user’s body size, posture, or mobility.