TRB webinar proposals submission deadline looms

Please submit your TRB standing committee’s webinar proposals by Monday, Oct. 15, 2018. This includes proposals for the TRB Standing Committee on Geosynthetics, chaired by Dr. Jennifer Nicks. The deadline applies to webinars that TRB will host during the first half of 2019 (January 1–June 30).

After October 15, TRB will review forms and respond to proposers in November 2018 regarding scheduling the webinar or will provide reasons why the proposal was not selected. Next, TRB will contact the listed panelists, coordinate schedules, and select dates for practice and live webinars. Forms include a field to suggest a timeframe for TRB to host the webinar, but TRB staff will coordinate scheduling in order to accommodate an estimated 100 webinars in calendar year 2019. TRB will do its best to honor requested timeframes.

While webinar suggestions do need approval from chairs or co-chairs, anyone may submit webinar proposals, so please spread the word.

Proposals that meet the following criteria have been selected and well received by webinar attendees:

1. Focus on practical messages. On average, 60 percent of attendees are employed at state departments of transportation. Therefore, webinar proposals should target methods, techniques and practices that can be applied on-the-job.
2. Complete the full webinar form without placeholders. Do not use “to be determined” or placeholders for any information in the form. Only completed webinar suggestion forms will be considered, including presenters’ names and contact information, an outline, learning objectives, and a one-paragraph description of the session. Please include in your description a sentence convincing a prospective attendee why they should convince their supervisor that it’s important for them to attend the webinar.
3. Receive approval of the proposal by Committee Chair. If the webinar proposal is organized by a TRB Standing Committee, then the chair must review the proposal.
4. Avoid proprietary information. Most TRB webinars provide credits for continuing education. If a proposal appears to be commercial in nature, TRB will ask that it be revised to focus on more general practices or techniques so that it remain eligible for education credits.
5. Convert a successful live presentation into a webinar format: Some successful webinars have repackaged presentations from meetings, conferences, or sessions. However, if you choose to repackage a previous conference session as a webinar, it’s best to highlight one successful session from a conference rather than providing a broad overview of the entire conference. Attendees value specific, actionable information.

A committee or individual’s past track record of organizing well-received webinars will also be considered. Committees who have not proposed webinars, particularly in the freight, rail, aviation, transit, marine, or pedestrian/bicycle topic areas, as well as those that focus on underserved populations, including those in rural and tribal areas, are encouraged to apply.

To suggest more than one webinar, the Bulk Webinar Suggestion form may be submitted. Contact Elaine Ferrell at EFerrell@nas.edu to receive the Bulk Webinar Suggestion form.

To submit a webinar proposal, visit https://tinyurl.com/TRBWebinarProp.

For questions, please contact Elaine Ferrell.