Call for Speakers

DrupalCon speakers and participants reflect our amazing community of end-users, translators, organizers, executives, marketers, editors, content strategists, designers, developers, and more. 

Contributing your voice and expertise drives Drupal’s continued evolution and success. Speakers often strengthen their networks as a result of this opportunity for increased visibility and thought leadership. Please review the content below before you submit your session. Also please add speaking@association.drupal.org to your contact list so you don’t miss any important updates about your session! 

The submission deadline is Monday, 17 October at 23:59 UTC.
 

Submit your session

Timeline

  • 12 September - Call for speakers submissions open
  • 17 October - Call for speakers submissions close
  • 13 February - Accepted speakers and facilitators notified  
  • 20 February - Accepted speakers and facilitators confirmation

Making DrupalCon diverse & inclusive

The Drupal Association is committed to a brave and inclusive event for all, regardless of age, body size, caste, disability, ethnicity, gender, language, nationality, physical appearance, race, religion, sexuality, and socioeconomic status.

We strongly encourage submissions from speakers and facilitators who have been marginalized due to racism, misogyny, transphobia, ableism, and other forms of globalized oppression.

Submission guidelines

  • Sessions should share knowledge and enhance the community—rather than sell products or services.
  • Preference will be given to sessions that aren’t already available online.
  • We encourage longtime DrupalCon speakers to partner with other community members - new speakers are welcome!
  • To create well-rounded presentations with varied perspectives, we encourage session partnerships between service providers and clients and generally recommend that speakers and panel facilitators represent different organizations.
  • The number of speakers and panel facilitators per session is limited. See information in the session types section below.
  • To encourage diversity, we will only accept panels that include speakers from underrepresented communities.
  • Speakers may submit no more than two session proposals.
  • Accepted speakers and panel facilitators may participate in a maximum of two sessions, only one of which can be a solo session.
  • Speakers and panel facilitators are required to read and adhere to the DrupalCon Code of Conduct.
  • Submitters may edit their submission until the submission deadline.

Session types

All session types are 50 minutes. 

  • Fireside chat: Fireside chats are casual conversations between a facilitator, an interviewee, and the audience, without the aid of slides. (1 facilitator and 1 interviewee)
  • Lecture presentation: Your typical conference presentation. Q&A is highly encouraged. (1-2 speakers)
  • Panel: Panels bring together diverse perspectives for spirited debate and discussion between panelists and participants without the aid of slides. Panels are not a series of short presentations. (1 facilitator and up to 3 panelists)
  • Workshop: Workshops provide active and in-depth learning through hands-on activities. Participants should leave with a tangible skill or product. (1-2 facilitators and speakers)

Content focus areas

Community health This track is designed to help all Drupalists be happy and healthy at work, be a productive team and community member, and ultimately build a strong, diverse, and welcoming community. Sessions may include ideas about building community and increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion within the Drupal community and tips for improving mental and physical health.
Content & marketing  Calling all content managers, digital strategists, and marketers--this track is for you! We’re looking for sessions on Drupal’s capabilities for content management and digital marketing, as well as creative ways to use Drupal for meeting digital campaign goals.
Development & coding  This track is for front- and back-end developers alike, covering all things front-end, back-end, migration, decoupling, and more.
DevOps: This track is for the Drupalists working behind the scenes to deploy high-quality code continuously. Topics include infrastructure, quality assurance, and testing, performance, and scalin
DevOps This track is for the Drupalists working behind the scenes to deploy high-quality code continuously. Topics include infrastructure, quality assurance, and testing, performance, and scaling.
Drupal showcase Inspire your peers and shine a spotlight on your recent Drupal projects. We’re looking for case studies that show the project’s inner workings, who participated, process and methodology, problem or opportunity addressed, and how it was all made possible with Drupal. Note: This track is for showing, not selling.
Leadership, management & business  This track is for agency leaders, executives, and people and project managers. Submissions should share your business strategy and development ideas, human resources, staff management, and project management.
Site building  This track is for those who build Drupal sites using the administrative interface. We’re looking for submissions on the topics of site building approaches and modules.
User experience, accessibility & design Designing for usability, accessibility, and universal access and inclusion should be prioritized. This track is for anyone who wants to make Drupal and the web more usable and accessible.

Difficulty criteria

Content Focus
AUDIENCE
Anyone
Beginner
Intermediate
Advanced

Community health

This session is appropriate for audiences of all levels

I am new to the Drupal community, and looking for ways to plug in 

I am an experienced community member who is actively contributing

I am a community leader/subject matter expert 

Leadership, management & business 

I work in an agency team or business that uses or is looking to use Drupal

I am a senior team member in an agency or business that uses or is looking to use Drupal

I am an agency owner or leader of teams that use or are looking to use Drupal

Development & coding 

I am a junior developer or student looking to become a developer

I am a developer with experience in Drupal and associated technologies

I am an experienced developer with expertise in Drupal and associated technologies

Drupal showcase

agency team or business that uses or is looking to use Drupal

I am a senior team member in an agency or business that uses or is looking to use Drupal

I am an business leader or lead teams that use or are looking to use Drupal

Content & marketing 

I am new to  content strategy & marketing but want to learn more

I am familiar with content strategy & marketing but want to improve my knowledge

I am an experienced content strategist and Drupal CMS user

DevOps

I am a junior developer or student looking to become a developer

I am a developer with experience in Drupal and associated technologies

I am an experience developer with expertise in Drupal and associated technologies

User experience, accessibility, & design 

I am a junior design or I work with designers and interested to know more

I am a designer or UX professional or work with design team to implement their designs

I am an experienced designer or UX professional or work with design teams to implement their designs

Site building

I am new to building websites on Drupal but want to learn more

I am familiar with Drupal as a CMS but want to improve my knowledge

I am an experience Drupal CMS user

** Thank you so much to Will Huggins for collaborating to create these criteria!

Creative, active, & experimental sessions

Do you have an idea that doesn’t fit the topics above? Submit it! We welcome your creative ideas.

Evaluation criteria

A First Choice Submission
A Second Choice Submission 
A Third Choice Submission
* The session has been cultivated to ensure it is accessible and inclusive of anyone who may be in the target audience.  The session is either accessible or inclusive, but not both.  The session is not accessible or inclusive. 

Content of the session is very well-suited to the content area. 

 Content of the session is fairly well-suited to the content area.  Content of the session is hardly well-suited to the content area or not at all.

The session is highly engaging and interesting for an in-person audience. 

 The session is fairly engaging and interesting for an in-person audience

The session is hardly engaging for an in-person audience or not at all. 

The session description contains a high level of detail that demonstrates knowledge of the content area, as well as facilitation style. 

The session description contains some detail that demonstrates knowledge of the content area and/or facilitation style.  

The session description is not very detailed, and/or content and facilitation style is unclear. 

The speaker has self-identified as a member of a historically marginalized group and is highly qualified. 

The speaker has self-identified as a member of a historically marginalized group.

The speaker has not self-identified as a member of a historically marginalized group and/or is not qualified.

The speaker has a strong connection to the content with which they are presenting and is identified as a content expert. 

The speaker is connected to the content with which they are presenting, but may not necessarily be a content expert. 

The speaker does not have a strong connection to the topic with which they are presenting. 

* The session is novel: either is unduplicated or is the very best representation of a session topic. 

The session is unduplicated. 

Either the session is unduplicated, but not contemporary or it is duplicated and is NOT the best representation of the session topic. 

* This criterion is required for all first choice sessions 

How to submit

  • Visit the DrupalCon Sessionize submission page

  • Click the “submit your session” button.

  • Login/register with a social networking site or use a username and password. (Note: Drupal.org credentials will not work here.) If you choose to create a username and password, check your email for a message from “Sessionize.com <event@notifications.sessionize.com>” and click the link to confirm your account.

    • If you click on the link in your confirmation email, it will take you to the submission site for DrupalCon Pittsburgh

  • Enter your session details 

  • IMPORTANT: Enter the email addresses of co-speakers and facilitators at the bottom of the session submission page

    • Co-speakers and facilitators will receive an email from “DrupalCon Pittsburgh 2023” inviting them to join the session as a speaker.

    • Be sure to check your promotional, social, junk and spam folders.

    • These invitations expire, so please ensure you and your co-speakers confirm and complete your Sessionzie profile before they expire. If they do expire, we can re-invite you manually. 

  • Once submitted, look for a confirmation email from “DrupalCon Pittsburgh 2023.”

Resources for writing learning objectives