Poster Sessions

ACL Annual Conference Poster Sessions are an opportunity for librarians and library staff from any type of library to share an idea, tool, program, or project that has been successful for their organization. These posters will be shared virtually in Whova, our conference app, and at a dedicated conference session on the afternoon of Wednesday, June 7 for in-person conference attendees.

Do you have an idea, discovery, or experience, that you want to share with fellow librarians? Presenting a virtual poster during the ACL Conference provides you with a great opportunity to share what you know with others! We want to hear your ideas about social media, information literacy, management and leadership, student workers, professional development, reference consultations, assessment, budgeting/cost savings, marketing and outreach, technology trends, and so much more! Submissions within any topic relevant to librarians and information professionals are welcome. Posters are easy, non-overwhelming ways to exhibit innovations, cool tools, or projects to your colleagues. Poster presenters must be registered for conference, either as an in-person attendee or online participant.

Poster Details

• No matter if you’ll be participating in conference virtually or in person, posters will be uploaded to the conference hosting platform Whova. (PDF Only – Max File Size: 10 MB). This allows both in-person and virtual participants to view and engage with your poster content. In-person conference participants are highly encouraged to have their poster printed and engage face-to-face during the scheduled Poster Session Wednesday afternoon (6/7/23) during the in-person conference.
• Poster sessions should include high-quality posters and professional presentation of the material. Each poster should be well organized, engaging, creative, and content should be relevant to librarians and information professionals.
• Presenters should to link to a video (YouTube or Vimeo) walkthrough of their poster presentation (no longer than 5 minutes), which will act as a guided presentation for attendees to view or listen to while viewing the poster.
• Posters can be created using the software of your choice. PowerPoint and Canva are popular choices.
• Due to the virtual nature of attendee participation online, we recommend that your poster be more vertical than horizontal. This way the participant can read what’s on the screen, then scroll down for further information. Infographic templates in Canva make great virtual poster templates due to their vertical layout.
• After the poster proposal is accepted, each poster presenter will receive their own poster session profile link to upload their pdf poster and link to video.
• A zoom training session will be available the week of April 17 for all poster presenters to share guidance for the process, best practices, and to answer any questions.
• Posters will be available for viewing in Whova during both the in-person conference (June 6-8) and virtual portion of conference (June 26-27) with opportunities to engage with attendees via chat, and available for 6 months post-conference.
• In-person attendees will have the opportunity to upload their poster and have it printed locally to avoid the hassle of traveling with their poster.
• Poster uploads to Whova must be completed no later than May 19.

Poster Awards

• People’s Choice Award
  This award will continue in 2023. Attendees will vote for their favorite poster through a poll in Whova, and the winner will receive a $25 gift card!
• Idea of the Day Award
  This second award category will be adjudicated by a panel. This award goes to the poster which has the most innovative idea, interesting concept, or demonstrates the most creative problem-solving. This winner will also receive a $25 gift card.

Poster Session Resources

Not sure how to create a poster that is sure to be a winner? Check out these resources for ideas.

• 2022 People’s Choice Award Winning Poster
  Marketing with March Book Madness by Amber Wessies
  Poster & video
• 2022 Idea of the Day Award Winning Poster
  Creating a Room without Building Walls by Noelle Keller
  Poster & video
• How to Design a Research Poster in Canva
• How to Create an Academic Poster in Powerpoint

If you have questions about the poster sessions for the upcoming 2023 Annual Conference, please contact William Modrow, Conference Poster Session Coordinator.