NACUBO 2024 Annual Meeting
NACUBO invites you to elevate your impact by submitting your content ideas for the NACUBO 2024 Annual Meeting happening July 20–23 at McCormick Place in Chicago.
We are looking for proposals that—
- Offer innovative solutions and showcase new and novel ideas
- Provoke discussion and audience engagement
- Facilitate learning and competency development
The submission deadline is Monday, October 23, at 11:59 pm ET. Submitters will be notified of decisions by January 26, 2024.
If a proposal is accepted, NACUBO expects all speakers and panelists to be present in-person. We will not accommodate online speakers or panelists for this event.
Meeting Theme: Elevate Your Impact
Higher education is faced with remarkable challenges and opportunities that drive leaders to explore innovative approaches toward positive impact. This program will encourage attendees to think beyond limitations to take strategic, meaningful action. We look forward to connecting with colleagues in Chicago to not only expand our members’ professional development opportunities, but also to explore how members can elevate their impact on their teams, their campuses, and the profession.
About This Program
Each year, NACUBO welcomes higher education business leaders and business partners within the profession to engage with and learn from one another about the most pressing topics and challenges to strategize forward-thinking solutions.
In 2023, the annual meeting included more than—
- 2000 attendees
- 70 educational sessions
- 180 speakers
- 35 sponsors
- 130 exhibiting companies
Session Content
NACUBO features sessions that showcase future trends; offer unique ideas; share interesting stories/case studies; foster diversity, equity, and inclusion; and accelerate innovation. We welcome proposals that challenge higher education professionals to think broadly and boldly about the future of higher education, as well as those that take deep dives into the tactical and practical skills necessary for effective higher education business operations. Session proposals should focus on one or more of the following questions and themes:
- How should business practices evolve to serve future generations of students and ensure access, affordability, and success?
- How can we prepare, equip, and empower institution leaders to make prudent, strategic decisions to shape the next decade and beyond?
- How can business officers enhance their leadership, innovation, and collaboration to positively impact the success and growth of their institutions?
- Include as much detail as possible about the presentation in your description. Be clear about your topic, session format, and how you plan to make your session interactive.
- Include three learning objectives for your presentation. When writing learning objectives, focus on the participant and the specific knowledge, skills, and abilities that can be achieved from your presentation. Learning objectives should complete the sentence, “After completing this session, attendees will be able to...”
- Provide audience takeaways. Tell us what an audience of higher education business professionals will gain by participating in your session.
- Gear the presentation toward an audience at the intermediate to advanced level of understanding, rather than basic treatments or overviews.
- Identify your audience, if applicable. NACUBO continues to focus on programming of interest to institutions of similar type and size. If your presentation specifically addresses the needs of a specific group (for example, community colleges or small institutions), indicate this by adding it to your proposal description.
- Describe how your presentation will incorporate NACUBO’s principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Topic Areas
We are seeking presentations that address the most pressing, current, and emerging issues facing higher education. NACUBO is eager to receive proposals from all types of institutions, and we are especially interested in ensuring our members at small colleges, community colleges, and minority-serving institutions are represented on the program.
Potential topic areas include the following:
- Accounting trends and best practices
- Alternative revenue streams
- Artificial intelligence in the business office
- Benchmarking to improve performance
- Bringing sustainability or energy efficiency to business operations and/or facilities
- Campus partnerships (internal and external collaborations)
- Communicating financial information effectively to stakeholders
- Connecting mission and fiscal resources
- Diversity, equity, and inclusion in the business office
- Endowment management
- Enrollment management
- Exploring challenges specific to certain segments of the higher education sector, particularly community colleges, HBCUs or other minority-serving institutions, regional pubic institutions, small colleges, and/or systems
- Governance best practices and collaborating with the governing board
- Integrating finance data with other institutional data to improve data-informed decision-making
- International risk management, including emerging regulations
- Investing in technology and data infrastructures
- Leadership development
- Leveraging analytics for short- and long-term planning and budgeting
- New business models (e.g., non-traditional revenue streams, maximizing facilities)
- Physical infrastructure needs
- Process transformation (e.g., reporting, budgeting, cost containment, new systems)
- Strategic partnerships, including mergers and consolidations
- Student success initiatives
- Tax management
- Treasury and debt management
- Technological innovation to improve/enhance services and compliance
- Workforce challenges
Guidelines for Submission
Submission of a presentation does not guarantee participation in the program. Please review all details below before submitting.
Key Dates
- The deadline for submissions is Monday, October 23, at 11:59 pm ET.
- Acceptance notifications will be sent by January 26, 2024.
- Educational sessions will take place Sunday, July 21, through Tuesday, July 23.
NACUBO Membership
- NACUBO membership is required to speak at the NACUBO annual meeting. Tentatively accepted presentations that include speakers who have not renewed their 2024–25 membership by May 15 may be removed from the program. For additional information, visit our membership page.
Speaker Considerations
- Do not submit proposals unless each speaker listed in the proposal is available to present in Chicago during the program dates.
- Include all presenters that will take part in the presentation. Do not list presenters without definite commitment that they will be on the session. All presenter(s) must agree to the terms and conditions for participation.
- Each proposal must have at least one speaker from a college or university. Any submission that does not include a presenter from a college or university will be considered incomplete and will not be accepted. Product Demonstrations and Corporate Showcases are the only session formats that do not require a college/university speaker.
- There is a limit of four speakers per submission.
- Speakers selected from the call for proposals will not receive any royalties, honorarium, reimbursement of expenses, or other compensation from NACUBO in connection with the program.
- Speakers from colleges and universities will receive a discounted registration rate for the meeting.
- Speakers must complete an agreement form to be confirmed for a session.
Session Details
- Submission of a presentation does not guarantee participation in the program.
- Proposal submission topics cannot be changed after the review and selection process.
- NACUBO reserves the right to revise presentation titles or edit the session description of selected presentations for NACUBO promotional and program publications.
Thank you for considering these elements while putting together your proposal. We look forward to your submission!
Submit a Proposal
