Proposal Deadline is September 19
UPCEA is proud to present the 2026 DT&L conference. The event will continue the tradition of a welcoming and transformative professional development experience for individuals and teams working in the field of digital postsecondary education – from faculty and instructors to instructional designers and administrators.
Digital teaching and learning is integral to the future of higher education, particularly in the delivery of innovative teaching and learning experiences, access missions, and the entrepreneurial focus of today’s institutions. The event program will address the rapidly changing online and technology-enhanced learning landscape with the most current topics, technologies, and innovations that inform best practices, strategies, thought leadership, and enterprise considerations and improvements.
Especially of interest are presentations that are highly interactive in format, engage multiple presenters and institutions/organizations, and can address the needs of a wide range of institutional types and sizes, as well as diverse populations of students.
You will notice that rather than being prescriptive in the identification of themes for this year’s conference, we are NOT identifying desired proposal topics. Rather, this is an event by the digital teaching and learning community FOR the digital teaching and learning community. The #DTL26 advisory committee encourages prospective speakers to submit proposals on the leading edge of digital teaching and learning. Good, solid foundational practices will always be welcome submissions and will absolutely be considered during the important peer-review process. Each proposal will be scored on the essential elements found below. Those most attractive to your peers in digital teaching and learning will be invited to participate in the event’s program.
Need help developing your proposal for the Digital Teaching & Learning (DT&L) Conference? This AI-powered assistant, the DT&L Proposal Coach is here to guide you through the process. Whether you're refining a big idea or starting from scratch, the assistant helps you generate a strong session title, compelling description, clear learning outcomes, and effective engagement strategies—customized to fit DT&L’s audience and session formats. Once you access the coach, it starts by asking a few guiding questions to help shape your proposal. You'll get step-by-step support, helpful prompts, and even a final proposal formatted for submission that you can copy & paste into the submission form**. Plus, it checks to make sure your session’s content matches your selected presentation level, and it offers guidance based on your expertise. It's your creative partner in building a proposal that’s clear, engaging, and ready for peer review.
Access the DT&L Proposal Coach
(a Custom GPT developed by UPCEA)
* We encourage proposers to use the AI proposal coach to refine their ideas, but please make sure your session reflects your own experiences and ability to deliver what is described.
** The AI Assistant does not submit on your behalf or access UPCEA’s proposal system. You will not be prompted for any user credentials. Do not enter any into the AI assistant.
Proposals are expected to highlight a deeply relevant topic and explore trends and developments in our field, share innovative solutions, disseminate research, explore emerging or best practices, and/or examine controversial ideas which evoke debate and discussion.
Proposals will offer learning outcomes/goals and a clear plan to engage the audience, and will denote a particular presentation format as well as content “level” (i.e., foundational, applied, or strategic).
Proposals should include the names of all speakers at the time of submission.
Presenters are expected to have knowledge and significant experience in online learning and must include complete contact information for all presenters.
Proposals by corporate members must include a current UPCEA institutional member as co-presenter. Information about UPCEA membership is found here.
Proposals which do not meet the above elements will be considered incomplete and will not be reviewed. Click here to view UPCEA Member-Curated Resources For Submitting Proposals
Selected presenters are responsible for all expenses incurred in conjunction with the event including registration.
The proposal system cannot path questions based on responses so all users will see specific questions on workshop and research sessions regardless of their selections.
There will be approximately 5 workshops (60-minutes) and 18-20 concurrent sessions (45-minutes). Digital copies of presentation materials will be collected from presenters in advance of the conference for dissemination via the event platform.
Conference organizers reserve the right to revise presentation titles, designate a conference track, combine sessions, or edit the description of selected presentations for promotional and program publications.
Proposals will be selected to ensure the event offers a comprehensive, noncommercial, objective, and diverse program. Attention will be given to diversity of institutions, presenters, and geographic location.
All proposals will be peer-reviewed and evaluated on these criteria:
Practical methods and techniques that others can use and apply
Clear learning goals and key takeaways
Relevance to the field of digital education and online learning
Depth of knowledge conveyed related to digital teaching, learning, and training
Inclusion of evaluation data and/or established theoretical models
Evidence of successful outcomes or lessons learned
If your proposal is accepted, you agree:
to attend a training session the week of December 8.
to register for the conference by December 10.
to provide electronic versions of presentations, materials/handouts for attendees by January 21, 2026
that if stated deadlines are not met, the conference organizers reserve the right to select an alternate presentation in its place.
July 23: Request for Proposals announced
September 19: Proposals due
Week of October 24: Selected proposals notified
General Sessions - 60-minute panel/presentations followed by location-specific activities (45-minutes) and community share (highlighting/sharing the location-specific activities for 15-minutes).
Workshops - 60-minute sessions that provide a high-quality, interactive, and practical experience to develop participants’ knowledge and skills in a specific area. Workshops are deep dives, wherein participants are actively, tangibly engaged in their learning, via collaboration and hands-on interaction. Workshop presenters generally spend less than half of the session sharing their ideas and information, followed by a planned activity that promotes interaction and discussion, generally ending with a takeaway for participants.
Concurrent Sessions: Presentations & Panels - 45-minute presentations, panels, or case studies. Regardless of content format, speakers should plan no more than 30-35 minutes for their content and allocate 10-15 minutes to discussion and Q&A. Further, speakers should strive to present information geared towards an experienced, bordering on expert, audience. Background or foundational concepts should be included in a “resources or a ‘learn more about…’” slide at the end of the presentation.
UPCEA Talks - 10-minute focused presentations grouped by theme (presenters will speak once for their allotted time within the session block). During one, 45-minute concurrent session, presenters will present in sequence, organized around a common theme or issue identified in their initial conference proposal. Lightning talks are designed to elevate important topics, opportunities, and solutions attendees may be wrestling with at their institutions. Lightning sessions will have a moderator who will welcome attendees, introduce each speaker, and watch the time, ensuring presenters stick to their allotted time to allow all scheduled presenters to do so. This session format allows attendees to engage with up to five different topics/presenters in one session. Note: Talks hosted by corporate members will be grouped under ‘Industry Insights’.
Please contact our team at pd@upcea.edu.
