VRA 2025: Call for Proposals

The Visual Resources Association invites proposals for our 2025 Annual Conference, to be held at the Porter Hotel in Portland, OR, October 7–9, 2025. Submissions open Monday, January 27. 

The submission deadline is Friday, March 14, 2025, at 11:59 pm PDT.

Whether you are a current member or a potential attendee, we encourage you to reflect on your experiences, ideas, and expertise. We encourage submissions from VRA members and non-members, seasoned attendees and first-timers, as well as students, early-career, mid-career, and senior professionals.

Please direct any questions about the submission process to VRA’s Directors for Events & Initiatives at initiatives@vraweb.org. 

VRA 2025 Virtual Whiteboard

Interested in engaging with the VRA community to develop or refine a proposal or suggest ideas? VRA's Education Committee has set up a Virtual Whiteboard where you can brainstorm collaboratively about potential papers, panels, special interest/user groups, workshops, meetings, and poster sessions. Reach out to the Education Committee co-chairs at education@vraweb.org if you have any questions about the whiteboard. 

Suggested Topics

We welcome proposals on a wide range of topics related to visual resources, including case studies, lessons learned (both successes and challenges), practical applications, innovative methods, ongoing projects, ethical considerations, research, and pedagogical practices. Suggested topics include:

  • Coding

  • Community outreach

  • Copyright/intellectual property

  • Digital asset management, digital curation, digital preservation, etc.

  • Digitization (workflows, digital capture and imaging technologies)

  • Digital scholarship and digital humanities

  • Diversity, equity, inclusion, cultural competencies, social justice

  • Project management (communication, grant writing, prioritization, leadership, etc.)

  • Linked data

  • Materials/objects collections

  • Metadata/cataloging ethics (decolonizing vocabularies, radical cataloging)

  • Storytelling and oral history

  • Technologies (GIS and mapping, 3D imaging, etc.)

  • Tools: open source, evolution, future trends

  • Workplace cultures and professional transitions (academic departments, libraries, cultural heritage institutions, archives, corporate, etc.)

This is not an exhaustive list. Do not hesitate to propose something new or highlight an area of concern that you feel has not been adequately addressed in the past! 

Past conference schedules can give you an idea of the range of topics presented in previous years.

Conference Format

As we look ahead to VRA 2025, we are excited to announce a carefully considered shift in the structure for our upcoming annual conference. 

Five years since the onset of the pandemic, the landscape of large-scale conferences has profoundly transformed. Priorities have shifted, placing greater emphasis on health and safety, accessibility, affordability, and environmental sustainability. These changing expectations have inspired us to reimagine how we structure our conferences to better serve our community.

Over the past three years, the VRA Annual Conference has embraced a hybrid model, accommodating virtual and in-person attendance with a mix of in-person and remote presenters. However, in 2025, we are embarking on a new approach to enhance the experience for all participants.

VRA 2025 will feature two distinct components: virtual pre-conference programming held a week prior to the main event, followed by three days of on-site conference programming at the Porter Hotel in Portland, OR.

On-site conference attendees will automatically be registered for the virtual pre-conference, and folks unable to attend on-site will have the option to register for the virtual pre-conference programming separately. 

This change is designed to ensure flexibility and accessibility while creating a more engaging experience. It will also lessen the burden on both our organization’s finances and the volunteers who make this event possible. Furthermore, by separating virtual and on-site programming, we aim to avoid the challenges posed by the hybrid model, which often leads to a fragmented experience for both in-person and virtual participants.

To help us in this effort, we invite you to share your feedback through an anonymous survey. Your voice matters, and we want to hear from you as we work toward a more inclusive and engaging conference. Click here to access the feedback form.

Working together, we can design a conference experience that adapts to the evolving expectations of our field for 2025 and beyond.

Please direct any questions about the conference format to VRA’s Directors for Events & Initiatives at initiatives@vraweb.org. 

Proposal Types

VRA 2025 is an in-person conference, and accepted speakers are expected to deliver their presentations onsite (barring extenuating circumstances). To accommodate those unable to attend in person, there will be a limited number of all-virtual sessions during pre-conference programming the week of September 29, 2025. Presenters should plan their submissions and participation accordingly.

Committees, chapters, and user groups may choose to meet virtually before the conference, in-person during the conference, or both (two meetings, one virtual and one in-person).

Please note, there will be a separate call for posters in June 2025.

Individual Paper (15–20 minutes): Individual presentations that may highlight new research, a project, a case study, or an innovative idea relevant to the VRA community. Papers should aim to provide attendees with fresh tools, strategies, or inspiration they can apply in their own practice. Grouped thematically with other individual papers into sessions with a total run time of 60 to 90 minutes, including a Q&A.

Lightning Talk (5–7 minutes): Short individual presentations addressing a timely or specific topic. Lightning talks provide attendees the opportunity to hear about a range of innovative projects or ideas from a broad group of colleagues in a short amount of time. Grouped into sessions that may or may not be themed, with a run time of 60 minutes, including a Q&A.

Pre-coordinated Panel (60–90 minutes): Moderated sessions typically consisting of 3–4 presenters speaking for 15 minutes each, followed by a facilitated Q&A. Panels provide attendees with diverse perspectives on a single topic, a comparison of tools or methods, or a number of case studies on related subjects. If you are proposing a panel, it is your responsibility to fill the time with presenters. It is not necessary to identify all potential presenters before submitting, but conference planners will need names of presenters several months prior to the conference.

Workshop (90 minutes–3 hours): An opportunity to teach and explore a specific tool, technique, workflow, or concept relevant to the VRA community. Recent conference workshops have included sessions on digital cartography, accessibility, salary negotiation, critical cataloging, grant writing, coding, open data, photogrammetry, and more. 

Special Interest or User Group (60 minutes): Small, informal, facilitated group discussions on topics or tools related to specific segments of the VRA community. Facilitators may propose a meeting for an existing group, or you may also propose a meeting for a topic of interest to you to see if others share that interest.

Committee or Chapter Meeting (60 minutes): Sub-groups within VRA can use conference time to gather and discuss their efforts to continue the work of the organization. These groups are generally regional chapters or established organizational committees.

Schedule

  • January 27: Call for Proposals opens

  • March 14, 11:59 pm PDT: Call for Proposals closes

  • On or around May 5: Notification of final decisions

  • On or around June 2: Tentative programs released for conference and virtual pre-conference

Code of Conduct

All presenters are expected to adhere to VRA’s Conference Code of Conduct.