Greening the Heartland 2007
September 12-14, 2007
Monona Terrace Convention Center, Madison, Wisconsin

The Wisconsin Green Building Alliance is proud to be this year’s host for Greening the Heartland 2007. Greening the Heartland is the annual meeting place for Regional Heartland Chapters of the U.S. Green Building Council. This event is planned by representatives from these chapters to address a broad array of regional issues and to educate attendees in smart, innovative, responsible practices and implementation. We are looking for high level, advanced presentations for current practitioners from experienced professionals in the fields of architecture, engineering, planning, landscape design, contracting and building, urban design, interior design and building ownership, operation and maintenance, who will share information and inspiration on respective projects, successes, challenges and opportunities!

PROGRAM INFORMATION

This year's Greening the Heartland Conference tracks are structured around the LEED categories of site, water, energy & atmosphere, materials & resources, environmental quality, and innovations.

GUIDELINES FOR SUBMITTING ABSTRACTS

All abstract submissions must be done online and must be submitted by March 5, 2007, 11:59 p.m. CST. Please note, you will not be able to start a new proposal if you have an incomplete submission already in the system. At the conclusion of your submission, be sure to save your tracking number—it will serve as your identification number for corrections, scheduling and notification.

The conference tracks are structured around the LEED categories of site, water, energy & atmosphere, materials & resources, environmental quality, and innovations.  The abstracts should relate in some way to one or more of these tracks, but can also include bioregionalism, land ethics and the business of green buildings.  The abstracts MUST focus in some way on issues relative to the Heartland region, i.e. a paper on site considerations in California or energy consumption by buildings in the Northeast will NOT be considered.

PRESENTATION/PAPER FORMAT

All abstracts may be considered for two types of presentations and all submitters must identify the preferred presentation style (oral presentation or poster presentation) in the field provided.

An oral presentation will be approximately 20 minutes in length. Each educational session is 90 in length and will consist of no more than three presenters per session (decided upon by the Conference Program Committee), allowing for audience interaction by way of questions and answers. Each session will be coordinated and led by one moderator.

A poster presentation, which will be a poster display of photos, charts, narrative, etc. no bigger than 30” x 40”,  will be no more than 15 minutes long.

All submitters must provide three learning objectives that will be accomplished in the proposed presentation. A learning objective answers the question, "At the end of this presentation, the session attendees will be able to …"

All submitters must provide a brief biography; submitters must also submit 3 references and/or a list of conference events where you have delivered a similar presentation.

The primary author of the abstract is also the primary contact person for the submission. All information regarding the submission will be sent to the email address provided for the primary author.

All selected presenters will be requested to provide a PowerPoint presentation and/or papers by August 1, 2007 using the presentation standards provided on the conference website.

PRESENTER REGISTRATION RATE

Submission of this proposal is an acknowledgement that all proposal participants agree to:

• be available to present on any given day of the conference at any given time;
• register for the conference at the $95 reduced rate;
• and not sell any products or services during the program.

REVIEW PROCESS

The submissions will be assigned to members of the appropriate subcommittee for review and rating. Once review of all submissions is complete, the subcommittee will select the presentations that have high scores on the pre-established review criteria and that strongly support the key track topics as determined by the track subcommittee.

Each submission will be reviewed by a minimum of four reviewers; some may be reviewed more times.

In making final selections, the committee will be cognizant of selecting multiple presentations by one individual or by a specific company or organization. A subcommittee may recommend a submission for a poster presentation.

All involved reviewers/committee members are listed on the greeningtheheartland.org website on the program committee list. Committee members who felt they were not qualified or may be biased were asked to remove themselves from the review of a submission.

REVIEW CRITERIA

Submissions will be evaluated based on the relevance to the audience comprised of architects, engineers, energy and water management specialists, urban planners, builders and contractors, landscape designers, facility and property owners and managers, government officials, and interior designers.

The technical quality of the presentation must demonstrate a credible basis supported by qualitative and quantitative data.

Each submission will be reviewed and scored in each of the six criteria areas on a scale of 1-5. A "general comment" field will also be available to the reviewers.

1. Innovation of Topic
2. Strategies/methodology to achieve outcomes and/or attainability of objectives
3. Relevance to the respective audience
4. Regional focus (may not be applicable to all submissions as we will include material from all parts of the country)
5. Technical quality of the data source; the robustness of the study and design methods
6. Overall merit of the abstract: clarity of description, creativity of presentation and scope of objectives

Numerical scores will provide a starting point for evaluation, but will not constitute the sole basis for selection and inclusion in the final program.

KEY DEADLINES

TECHNICAL SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS

Click Here for a PDF of the Above Information.

For general information on the conference program contact:

Connie Lindholm
Executive Director
Wisconsin Green Building Alliance
414.224.9422
connielindholm@wgba.org