Propose a Program - Annual Meeting

Faculty engagement is at the heart of the AALS Annual Meeting. AALS Sections organize 75 percent of Annual Meeting programs; the best way to get involved is to be an active member of a section. The rest of the programs are organized by individual faculty members whose proposals are selected by AALS program committees for one of the five types of AALS programs. Each type is detailed below. 

The 2026 Annual Meeting theme, selected by AALS President Austen Parrish, is Impact. Excellence. Resilience. The Enduring Contributions of Legal Education.

At the beginning of the 20th century, representatives of 35 law schools convened to establish a new association designed to strengthen American legal education, with the goal of producing lawyers, judges, and legal thought-leaders with the expertise and integrity essential for the country’s future. As we mark the Association’s 125th anniversary (and our 120th annual meeting), this year’s theme will look back at the enduring impact of American legal education, including the contributions of our faculty and staff colleagues, on our local communities, our nation, our society, and the world. The Program Committee encourages proposal organizers to consider using the 2026 theme in framing their proposals.

Addressing the theme is not required, but consideration will be given to programs with this theme as a focus.

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Section Programs

AALS Sections organize 75 percent of Annual Meeting programs. Each Section has the discretion to design a program that meets the needs of its members and may have unique requirements for participation. The best way to get involved is to be an active member of a section. Joining is simple: just click here.

Section programs may be jointly sponsored with one or more other sections, as one of the most valuable features of the Annual Meeting is the ability to engage multiple constituencies on a common topic. Program formats may include: 

  • Panel presentations, for which Section organizers may choose speakers from a call for papers; 
  • Works-in-Progress, in which junior scholars receive feedback on drafts from more experienced colleagues; or 
  • Pedagogy/Alternative formats. 

Section calls will open in late summer 2025.


AALS Programs & Requests for Proposals

Outside of Sections, AALS program committees select the rest of the Annual Meeting programs from proposals in two main categories: Arc of Career and Open Submission. The Open Submission category is divided into four subtypes, detailed below.  

For all AALS Programs

Programs may be proposed by full-time faculty members or administrators at AALS Member or Fee-Paid law schools. International faculty, visiting faculty (who do not retain a permanent affiliation at another law school), graduate students, and non-law school faculty are not eligible to submit proposals but may serve as presenters.

Program organizers should take the AALS core value of diversity into account and include junior faculty and participants who provide viewpoint diversity appropriate to the program and reflect a variety of law schools.


Arc of Career Programs

Proposals for Arc of Career Sessions at the 2026 Annual Meeting close on August 8th.

The AALS Arc of Career Committee organizes programs at the Annual Meeting to address a broad spectrum of issues related to the professional careers of law faculty and administrators rather than presenting panels on substantive legal topics. For those looking forward to the future of your career, what would you like to know? For those who are more senior in your career, what would you have wanted to know as you began your career?


Types of Program and Panel Proposals

The AALS schedules four types of open submission programs, which are more fully described below:

  1. Open-Source Programs: These offer an opportunity to present either traditional or innovatively structured programs that stand apart from those proposed by AALS sections.
  2. Discussion Groups: These provide a setting for focused discussions among a small group of invited discussants and engaged participation by the audience.
  3. Symposia: These are extended half-day sessions that focus on in-depth scholarly exploration of a topic of academic interest.
  4. Hot Topic Programs: These focus on topics that emerged too late in the year to be included in section programming.

Open Source, Discussion Group, and Hot Topic programs run for 75 minutes and should allow 15-20 minutes for audience participation and Q&A.

Symposia run for a half-day (3 hours) and should include sufficient time for audience participation at the end of each panel.

Deadlines

Discussion Groups: due August 8, 2025.
Open Source: due August 8, 2025.
Symposium proposals: due August 8, 2025.
Hot Topic proposals: due November 7, 2025.

Open Source Program Proposals

Proposals Due: August 8, 2025.

Proposals should follow the General Submission Guidelines set forth above.

Open Source programs may take many shapes: programs may be interdisciplinary and cut across the interests of two or more sections or subject areas, address themes outside the scope of any existing section, or focus on specific issues such as recent cases or developments in a given area of law.

Discussion Group Proposals

Proposals Due: August 8, 2025

Proposals for a Discussion Group should follow the General Submission Guidelines set forth above.

A Discussion Group provides a group of discussants the opportunity to engage in a sustained conversation about a shared topic of interest. Discussion Groups will not feature formal presentations. Instead, each discussant will typically prepare brief remarks of 3-5 minutes (some past discussion groups have referred to these presentations as “opening statements”). These initial presentations are intended to stimulate a lively and engaging discussion that will include both the discussants and members of the audience.

Symposium Proposals

Proposals Due: August 8, 2025

Symposium programs are full-day or half-day programs that conduct an in-depth exploration of a topic of academic and practical interest to the profession. The Committee is particularly interested in programs that connect to the annual meeting theme.

The Committee encourages Symposium organizers to arrange for the publication of the papers in a journal or edited volume.

If the Symposium is published in a student-edited law review, the AALS will waive the registration fee for up to two student editors from that law review to attend the Annual Meeting.

Hot Topic Program Proposals

Proposals Due: November 7, 2025.

Hot Topic programs focus on topics that emerge too late in the year to be included in other types of programs. Hot Topic program proposals that are selected by the Committee will be assigned a program
time slot by AALS staff. Due to constraints for scheduling late in the year and close to the time of the meeting, program times cannot be changed to accommodate specific speakers.

Hot Topic program organizers should check the preliminary Annual Meeting program on the AALS website to be sure that there is no substantial replication of the substance of a proposed hot topic program by a program already on the schedule.