In spring 2023, we hosted the first-annual Oklahoma Philosophy Day on the College of Central Oklahoma. The occasion was greater than only a convention, together with periods dedicated to group constructing, networking, and instructing together with analysis displays. We wished to share our experiences as organizers, within the hopes that they could be helpful to others enthusiastic about internet hosting the same occasion.
Earlier than COVID, our division hosted an undergraduate philosophy convention, with the usual format of offered papers from undergraduates, feedback from UCO college students, and an invited keynote speaker. We have been able to host our twenty fourth annual convention when COVID struck, cancelling the occasion in 2020. It remained dormant for the following two years, as surges in COVID variations made superior planning tough. As we mentioned bringing the occasion again, we realized we had a possibility to reconceptualize the convention and to show it into one thing extra inclusive and extra broadly interesting to philosophers within the state.
Our early perception was that philosophers do much more than simply current analysis. We wished to attempt planning an occasion that would come with different facets of what we do (comparable to instructing and group outreach). We additionally wished to create space for philosophers in any respect ranges, from pre-college college students at native colleges, to undergraduates at each two-year group faculties and four-year universities (whether or not a significant, a minor, or simply an scholar), to group members comparable to alumni or laypersons. The identical applies to philosophy instructors: Oklahoma has one PhD program and one terminal M.A. in philosophy, alongside UCO and different four-year establishments (private and non-private), plus fairly just a few two-year colleges. At many of those establishments, there could also be just one thinker on the school, or a number of adjuncts and not using a philosophy division. We wished to host an occasion that will be fascinating and helpful to all of us.
With this in thoughts, we determined to rebrand our “Annual Southwestern Convention for Undergraduate Philosophers” to the primary “Oklahoma Philosophy Day”. The outcomes, which we’ll talk about beneath, have been profitable far past our expectations, sufficient to soundly say that Oklahoma Philosophy Day may also be an annual occasion. In what follows we define our planning course of with a purpose to help different packages that could be enthusiastic about internet hosting the same occasion.
Oklahoma Philosophy Day was a one-day occasion, hosted by the Division of Humanities and Philosophy and the School of Liberal Arts on the College of Central Oklahoma campus on Saturday, February 25, 2023. We met from 9:00 am to five:30 pm. We alternated between plenary presentation periods and parallel panel discussions.
Our full schedule was:
9:00 – Open breakfast and registration
9:30 – Welcome and Opening Remarks
10:00 – Undergraduate Pupil Shows
11:30 – Dialogue Periods: (1) Going to grad colleges; (2) Philosophy exterior the academy
12:15 – Lunch
1:15 – Graduate Pupil Shows
3:00 – Dialogue Periods: (1) Philosophy Pupil Golf equipment; (2) Educating Roundtable
4:00 – Plenary Tackle (Heather Stewart, Oklahoma State College)
5:30 – Closing remarks
As well as, we had a sport room open all day, operated by a UCO school member and gaming aficionado.
We have been in a position to host all of our periods in a single hallway of the identical constructing, and breakfast and lunch have been each supplied on website. We had sixty-one complete members all through the day (plus about ten school and employees volunteers). Contributors included highschool and school college students, dad and mom of presenting college students, alumni, and instructors from 9 instructional establishments throughout the state.
The primary constraint on any occasion is funding and logistics, so we started by securing institutional help from our division and school. Along with internet hosting the occasion and offering technical help, our School and Division each pledged monetary backing and the help of employees to assist with planning and internet hosting the occasion. The Philosophy Club at UCO (our scholar group) additionally contributed to our price range and planning course of.
One in all our early priorities was to offer free breakfast and lunch to all members, figuring out that complimentary meals can be priceless to college students and school alike. We knew that this is able to require a bigger price range than we’d doubtless have the ability to safe internally. Some analysis pointed us to the Berry Fund for Public Philosophy, which we utilized for in October 2022. We have been in a position to dedicate this funding to our keynote honorarium, permitting us to order our personal institutional assets for the remainder of the price range.
After we realized we had obtained a grant from the Berry Fund in early December, we sprang into motion to start planning Oklahoma Philosophy Day in earnest. So as to accomplish our aim of bringing collectively philosophers throughout the state, we needed to manually gather e-mail addresses for each philosophy teacher and graduate scholar within the state we may discover. As soon as compiled, we despatched out a Save the Date in early December, hoping to catch folks’s consideration earlier than finals had ended. We adopted up in early January with extra occasion data and a registration kind, which included solicitations for scholar displays and dialogue session concepts.
We spent the following month constructing our program schedule and dealing on back-end logistical issues. To construct this system schedule, we sought to stability extra formal and casual periods with loads of alternative for dialogue. We had two scholar presentation periods and an invited public plenary session with a thinker from an Oklahoma establishment. For extra casual, interactive periods, we created parallel dialogue rooms that aimed to attraction to a large viewers. We additionally had a sport room open all day for casual interplay and philosophical dialogue. We additionally reached out to scholar organizations and undergraduate/graduate advisors to assist us promote the occasion to college students. We additionally labored with the general public plenary presenter, Dr. Heather Stewart from Oklahoma State College, to finalize the keynote particulars—a beautiful and well timed presentation titled “Discovering Philosophy’s Worth in a World of Generative AI.”
Alongside the best way, we had important assist from UCO college students and employees.
- Occasion brand and promotional supplies have been designed by our School’s Graphic Design Coordinator.
- Promoting to native excessive colleges was executed via the Workplace of Enrollment and Pupil Success.
- Expertise, together with operating the plenary session, was coordinated by our School’s Tech Assist Specialist.
- Planning, swag preparation, and promoting was assisted by our Philosophy Membership officers.
- Reserving rooms, handing funds, ordering meals and swag from a number of distributors, was masterfully completed by our School Administrative Specialist and division Administrative Assistant.
- The registration desk was staffed by school volunteers.
We’re extremely grateful for the entire assist we had in placing on the occasion: philosophy and occasion planning are very completely different talent units!
We have been pleased with the combo of session sorts we had and the pacing of the day. The varied periods have been welcoming for college kids of all ranges and familiarity with philosophy to see scholar displays and interact in small teams within the dialogue periods, within the sport room, and breaks.
We supplied a survey through QR code on the occasion and adopted up after with an e-mail. Responses have been overwhelmingly optimistic. Listed below are just a few:
- It was coordinated for all ranges.
- The displays have been over fascinating, and numerous, subjects.
- Cherished the interactiveness—conversational periods and the ambiance made taking part in conversations appear welcomed.
- I appreciated the displays and the video games. I appreciated how in between the displays, there was an interval of time to simply chat about philosophy or play philosophy video games. The day ending with a keynote speaker was simply the cherry on high.
- Collaborative, open, pleasant surroundings.
The survey feedback, together with the interpersonal interactions all through the day, counsel that we met a necessity in Oklahoma philosophy—the necessity for group. We have now already begun planning to host the occasion once more subsequent yr and to proceed fostering a group for philosophy in Oklahoma.
In reflecting on our experiences, there are just a few particular classes realized which can be price sharing:
- With a small window to arrange the occasion, we relied totally on e-mail for communication, and not using a convention web site for PhilEvents web page. This made it tough for attendees to trace down data and to speak to the group extra broadly.
- We have been extremely fortunate to have help from school employees, they usually helped us consider all types of issues we’d not have remembered on our personal (e.g., ordering additional trashcans from services for meals disposal). We each went into the planning levels with a “do it your self” mindset, which we shortly realized was pointless and counterproductive.
- Structured Free Time. One factor we didn’t anticipate was how well-liked the sport room can be. This was a novel function of a philosophy occasion, and one which allowed members to take a psychological break in the course of the day. In the same vein, one little bit of widespread suggestions we acquired after the occasion was that attendees wished some sort of organized dialogue in the course of the lunch session, slightly than being left to their very own gadgets. We realized that members admire being given an surroundings to calm down with out ceasing to take part within the occasion fully.
- It’s pure in planning a brand new occasion to concentrate on the myriad ways in which issues can go incorrect. We needed to frequently remind ourselves to contemplate how issues may go properly. One instance was watching RSVPs are available in and realizing that not solely have been folks , however that we have been going to have extra attendees than we initially anticipated.
Lastly, to reiterate what we mentioned above, we owe numerous the success of the occasion to the enthusiastic help of our school and division school and employees. After we first began batting across the concept of an Oklahoma Philosophy Day, the size of the occasion was daunting. However the school and employees we approached gladly provided the assets and help and made it occur. We’re wanting ahead to internet hosting one other profitable occasion in 2024.
Vanessa Bentley
Vanessa Bentley is Assistant Professor within the Division of Humanities and Philosophy on the College of Central Oklahoma, the place she teaches programs in philosophy of science, feminist philosophy, and utilized ethics. Her analysis pursuits are in neuroethics, bioethics, and feminist practices in science, significantly in cognitive neuroscience and the neuroimaging of gender/intercourse.
