Dear SCMS member:
 
We hope that you, your family and friends are safe, healthy and doing the best that one can amidst a global pandemic, a worldwide anti-racist movement, and all the uncertainties attendant upon teaching and other work this summer and fall. 
 
We are writing today to share two important changes to our usual summer deadlines for conference proposal submissions and membership renewals . 
 
Conference proposal submissions
We assure you that there will be an SCMS conference in 2021—whether in person, online, or in a hybrid format. We are currently assessing all of these options. In order to make an informed decision, the Board will consider public health and safety needs, your thoughtful survey responses (thank you!), SCMS’s financial situation, our current hotel contracts, the viability of online services, feedback from other scholarly organizations, and more.
 
We recognize you will want to know the format of the conference before you submit a proposal and our small office team will need time to adjust the portal accordingly. As a result, we will delay opening the submission process until August 1 . The deadline for seminar topics will be extended until August 21 . New proposals (for papers, panels, workshops and roundtables) and resubmissions (papers, panels, workshops and roundtables accepted for the 2020 Denver conference) will be due on September 15 .
 
Therefore, this summer, you will have two options: 
  1. You can resubmit your paper, panel, workshop, or roundtable from the cancelled 2020 conference, or;
  2. You can submit a new proposal. 

Resubmissions : While the conference submissions portal will clearly distinguish resubmissions from new proposals, please note the following guidelines:
  • Resubmitted Denver 2020 proposals (papers, panels, workshops, roundtables) will automatically be accepted.
  • If you resubmit your paper without the rest of your panel, you will be assigned to a new panel.
  • If your panel of four does not have the full slate of speakers, you may resubmit with three speakers. We hope to accommodate panel resubmissions that retain less original members, but will know more in the coming weeks.
  • Unfortunately, seminars may not be resubmitted, but can be reformatted as a new submission.
 
New Submissions : New submissions (papers, panels, workshops, roundtables, seminars) will be vetted by the program committee as usual. Because we are accepting resubmissions from Denver 2020, space will be limited for new submissions. That said, we aim to incorporate as many new proposals as we can. 
 
Updates on the 2021 conference and additional submission information will be sent in late July.  
 
Membership renewal
In addition to the anxieties of this tumultuous time, we understand that many of you are facing financial uncertainty: universities are freezing funding for conferences/travel, members are losing jobs and/or are unsure if they will have work in the fall, and many of our members are struggling to make ends meet. For these reasons and more, paying for your SCMS membership may be difficult or impossible right now.
 
Therefore, this year , you will not be required to join or renew your membership before submitting a 2021 conference proposal.  
 
SCMS relies on membership and registration fees to run the conference and maintain baseline operations for the organization. As part of our fiscal responsibility to members, we are committed to running a lean operation of five full- or part-time staff members. Unfortunately, the necessary cancellation of Denver 2020 was a huge fiscal blow for the Society: we face a financial shortfall of hundreds of thousands of dollars due to hotel cancellation fees, lost registration, and other costs related to preparing and running a conference. While the generosity of members who were able to donate their registration fees helped us honor some of these financial obligations, SCMS still lost a tremendous amount of money.
 
Unfortunately, a conference—in any format—will require dues and registration. That said, SCMS will adjust the 2021 conference registration based on the format. When you receive your conference acceptance letters, you will be asked to join or renew your membership before the 2021 conference program is assembled . This will assure your place on the program and ensure that we can run the conference.
 
We appreciate your support of SCMS and hope that these modifications to our usual procedures will help you at this difficult time. If you are in a position to donate to SCMS, we will gratefully welcome any help you can give. Donations can be made here .  
 
If you have questions about any of these changes, please wait until we announce the 2021 conference format. At that time, we will work to respond to all of your FAQs.  
 
Thank you for your patience,
 
The SCMS Board