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2009 Survey Results
2009 Annual Conference & Bookfair Each year following the annual conference, AWP conducts an online survey of conference attendees. AWP uses responses from that survey to improve the planning and execution of our conference, and to address the concerns and needs of our attendees and members. AWP is committed to providing the best service and experience to our conference attendees with the staff and resources available to us. AWP continues to improve our conference each year, and feedback from our attendees is a tremendous help to us in doing so. If you attended AWP’s 2009 Conference and had a question or concern not addressed in this report, please feel free to email us at conference@awpwriter.org. The survey report is available below and in pdf:
The charts in this report illustrate a comparison between the 2008 survey and the 2009 survey. We are happy to report that both surveys demonstrate a satisfaction rate among respondents of over 95%. Overall, the results were excellent in comparison to previous years’, and tremendous improvements have been made to the conference over the last two years in service and execution of events. However, AWP does recognize there’s always room for improvement and we will be consistently taking a critical look at ways to make the conference even more beneficial to our attendees and presenters.
*A few evening events and the Saturday bookfair were open to the public, increasing general attendance by more than 1,000 people. Click on the links below to review the results to a survey question:
Quantifying and Ranking the Written Comments Example: Comment (Number of Mentions within Written Comments Out of / 883 Survey Respondents with Written Comments/ 1334 Survey Respondents / 7748 Registered Attendees). 1. Comments saying the planned occupancy of rooms was inadequate and that rooms were too overcrowded or too large for the size of the crowd (132). 2. Comments saying presenters were not prepared for their event (88). 3. Comments saying there were scheduling conflicts due to similar category or genre events taking place at the same time (52). 4. Comments saying the space for registration was inadequate(48). 5. Comments saying the conference is too large (44). 6. Comments that the hotel was too expensive (43). 7. Comments saying the conference should not be held in the winter or is held too early in the year (41). 7. Comments saying presenters did not present on issues related to what was described in the program (41). 9. Comments saying there were not enough academic, craft-of-writing panels, and/or panels on pedagogy (40). 10. Comments about flow of traffic in the bookfair (38). 11. Comments saying presenters did not engage the audience (35). 12. Comments discussing unimaginative, uninspiring, dull panels that were not useful, did not teach anything new, did not support attendees’ needs, or were repetitive from previous years (31). 13. Comments saying the conference was too expensive (30). 14. Comments discussing the lack of variety in presenters in regards to wanting more lesser known presenters, to wanting younger presenters, or to having more of these people participate as headliners (29). 14. Comments saying there were not enough variety to the panels (29). 16. Comments saying there were not enough events centered on diversity issues (13). 17. Comments saying there were too many undergraduate/graduate students attending (12). 18. Comments saying there were not enough fiction events (11). 19. Comments saying the conference is never held on the west coast (10). 20. Comments saying there were not enough poetry events (9). 20. Comments saying the conference is too large to network (9). 20. Comments saying there were not enough non-fiction events (9). 20. Comments saying there were not enough playwriting/screenwriting events (9). 20. Comments saying there were not enough events on publishing (9). 25. Comments saying AWP needs to do more to support “green” initiatives (8). 26. Comments saying the AWP Bookfair closed too early in the day (7). 27. Comments saying there were not enough cross-genre events (6). 28. Comments about bookfair placement (5). 28. Comments saying there were not enough events related to avant-garde issues (5). 28. Comments saying there were not enough events on multi-media issues (5). 28. Comments saying the services provided by Freeman were inadequate (5).
AWP Responds to Written Comments AWP continues to improve our Conference each year, and feedback from our attendees is a tremendous help to us in doing so. If you attended AWP’s 2009 Conference and had a question or concern not addressed in this report, please feel free to email us at conference@awpwriter.org.
AWP received 132 written comments saying the planned occupancy of rooms was inadequate and that rooms were too overcrowded or too large for the size of the crowd. AWP does its best to ensure all the conference space is adequate for our attendees, and considerable time is devoted to this, but sometimes difficulties arise. We are aware of several crowding problems that occurred while in Chicago, particularly in the lake rooms on the 8th floor of the Hilton Chicago, but even with our experience running the conference, judging attendance for 330 plus specific events does not always go as well as we would like. As we move the conference around the country to reach as many of our constituents as possible, sometimes we will have better space available for the bookfair while other timeswe will have better space for the panels. In other words, we have to work with what is available to us, which unfortunately can make for some crowding. By many measures next year's venue at the Hyatt Regency Denver and the Colorado Convention Center should be less of an issue for crowding, as we'll probably have the best space we’ve ever had for the conference. 44 respondents felt that the conference has become too large. In 1989, 300 writers attended the Philadelphia Conference, about 2.5% of AWP’s 12,000 teachers, students, and members. In 2009, 7748 registered attendees came to the Conference, 23% of AWP’s total membership. It’s important for us to keep in mind that AWP’s larger conference has increased membership’s participation ten-fold. The size of the conference has also greatly improved the variety of aesthetic viewpoints, literary and pedagogical topics, publishing advice, administrative and career advice, and ethnic diversity. 9 comments were received saying the conference is too large to network. AWP believes as the conference grows the opportunity for networking actually increases due to a larger number of participating attendees and bookfair exhibitors. With the increased number of both large and small receptions, the expansion of the program directors’ meeting and various caucuses, the growth of the bookfair and number of overall events, there are more opportunities to network than ever before. Though newcomers can feel overwhelmed when first arriving to the conference, it’s not in the best interest of AWP or its members to decrease the size of the Conference. Still, we can try to develop new ways of facilitating networking among peers, as well as making our new-comer attendees feel welcome and well informed. To help people unfamiliar with our conference we have included a webpage exclusively to answer frequently asked questions by newcomers. AWP received 88 comments that presenters were not prepared for their event. 35 people commented that presenters did not engage the audience. 31 people commented on unimaginative, uninspiring, dull panels, that were not useful, did not teach anything new, did not support attendees’ needs, or were repetitive from previous years. We are definitely aware of the unfortunate habit by some presenters to arrive at their panel unprepared, give panel presentations where they read their own work when they are not supposed to, presenters speaking beyond their allotted time, or to not engage the audience. These are all things we strongly discourage particularly because we know the best panels are often the ones where presenters interact directly with those they're speaking to about the subject at hand, and the panels are mostly either accepted or rejected on the strength of their proposal which (if accepted) we advertise to our attendees. In other words, we want the panels to be as good as we imagine they could be when we accept them. 41 people commented that presenters did not present on issues related to what was described in the conference program. The event descriptions printed in the program are the copy that organizers provide when making their proposals (after copy editing). If events are not following their printed event description, this means that organizers are not delivering the event topics that were accepted in the proposal review process. AWP has a responsibility to provide accurate information to its attendees, as well as responsibility to see that accepted proposals are delivering the event promised. While events cannot be micro-managed, and while we understand that in such a creatively driven conference conversation may take surprising and delightful turns, we must see to it that all organizers are adhering as closely as possible to their event description so that attendees are not misled when deciding which events to attend. After all, with over 330 events, we have so many choices that attendees are often torn over what to attend, which makes it all the more disappointing for them when they arrive at an event that doesn’t proceed as expected. Given the size of the conference with over 1100 presenters, 330 plus events in three days, and despite our best efforts, we cannot always guarantee presenters will abide by their obligations to give the presentations they're capable of. We are very discouraged by this practice, and so will keep reminding our presenters and moderators by post and email to not only stick to their agreement with us, but also remind them to not read directly from papers, leave time for a Q&A, show up for their event prepared in a timely manner, follow the conversation indicated in their event description, and of other ways in which they can best fulfill their obligations to the audience.AWP will continue to provide all moderators and presenters with guidelines for their presentations in as many forms as possible. We must keep in mind that while respondents are rightly concerned with the lack of preparation on the part of some presenters, preparation has improved over the years. In the past two years over 70% of our survey respondents ranked preparation among presenters as “excellent” or “very good.” In 2006 7% of survey respondents ranked preparation as unsatisfactory, and over the last two years that number has dropped to 4%. While improvements have been made, we still seek ways of improving the events at the conference. In addition to creating the “new-comers” webpage, AWP should create a “presenters” webpage that includes everything a presenter needs to know for his/her event at AWP. Hopefully by providing such information in one central location, in addition to sending AWP’s guidelines by post and email, presenters will more easily familiarize themselves with them. On this page AWP may include survey results and commentary related to event preparation and management, so organizers and presenters may take these items into consideration. AWP will consider distributing blank survey templates for individual events on-site. A survey drop-box could be placed at registration, and individuals may complete surveys for single events by providing the event title on their form, answering standard questions and providing comments. Having such surveys on-site will not only assist our members in providing us with more feedback on individual events, but it will also give a greater sense of accountability among presenters and organizers of events. While AWP cannot consider micro managing the execution of events on-site, or force presenters into discussion with attendees, time for Q&A and limiting the number of panelists can be more strongly suggested or required in the guidelines. Many conferences, including MLA, require that organizers leave time for Q&A at the end of each session. AWP embraces the creativity that is often impromptu among our conference presenters, still we are obliged to provide our attendees with well thought out and well executed events. We must continue to improve the quality of our events and presentations to the best of our ability. AWP received 52 comments saying there were scheduling conflicts due to similar category or genre events taking place at the same time. We do work very hard to ensure conflicts in the schedule are avoided, but because the AWP Conference is the largest of its kind some conflicts are unavoidable. AWP has a large and diverse constituency and as such there are a lot of groups we need to avoid conflicts for. First and foremost we need to avoid conflicts within those groups. In other words, we need to make sure panels on special literary topics, disability, sexuality, latino/a, African-American, Native American, Asian-American, and all the many other groups that comprise AWP, are not scheduled against themselves as it would not be appropriate to have a panel on Asian-American Literature appear against an Asian-American reading. Beyond this, there are other contingencies to consider like the appropriateness of room size, AV requirements, and events that have to be scheduled at specific times. We try very hard to avoid conflicts with panels that deal with similar types of issues, but because of the size of the conference, with over 330 events in three days, conflicts outside of specific groups do sometimes appear. One of the problems with having a conference of this size is that there is hopefully going to be more things our attendees would like to see than they are able to. AWP has several staff and board members go over the schedule to try as much as possible to avoid conflicts, but there are just too many events to alleviate them completely. AWP received 48 comments that space designated for registration was inadequate at the Hilton Chicago. Similarly to the exhibit space for the AWP Bookfair, as we move about the country to try and reach as many of our members as possible, the hotels and convention centers we use can vary wildly. While some of them have better space available for the bookfair, others are better for meeting space or registration. In other words, the space we have to work with the space available to us, which unfortunately can make for some crowding. Because we anticipate there are going to be long lines at registration on Thursday morning, which tends to be when things are at their peak for check-in, we always encourage attendees to arrive on Wednesday to pick up their registration materials and thus be able to attend the Thursday morning events and avoid the registration crowds. In 2006 an additional pre-registration bay was added to help alleviate the dilemma of long lines at pre-registration. For the 2010 conference we are planning on adding another pre-registration bay. This year we also keep registration open two hours longer, until 7 PM, on Thursday to help accommodate as many late arrivals as possible. Every year we max out our staffing and volunteers at registration to help keep the lines as short as possible. In considering registration, we must keep in mind that over the years, registration is more often ranked as one of the most helpful components of the Conference. In 2006 just 18% of respondents indicated that registration services were a helpful component of the Conference. In New York 32% of the respondents indicated that registration services were helpful. This year the number dropped slightly to 26%. While we are discouraged the number dropped from New York to Chicago, we were definitely aware of the problems with the registration location this year as the space available to us for pre-registration was not as large as we would have liked. We are happy to say though that we anticipate next year's venue should be less of an issue for crowding as by many measures we'll probably have the best conference space we've ever had while in Denver for 2010. Still, as the Conference grows and registration numbers increase, we must take care to see offer the best service possible and address the concerns of our attendees and members. AWP received 43 comments that this year’s conference hotel was too expensive, particularly the food and beverage. Unfortunately when we visit cities like Chicago, where even street vendors are expensive, there is not much we can do to reduce the prices beyond hotel room rates and coffee stations. This year AWP had room rate at the Chicago Hilton of $164. Standard rates for the Hilton during AWP’s Conference were nearly $250 a night. At the Palmer House Hilton the standard rate was $179 a night (AWP’s Palmer House rate was $155). Above and beyond negotiating the best possible discount on hotel rooms, AWP provided coffee and lunch concessions in the exhibit hall; the expense of providing this service in the exhibit hall was subsidized by AWP. While the hotel bar and nearby bars were expensive, receptions offering free drinks were hosted each night for attendees, as well as an AWP Public Reception with free beer and wine for attendees each night. AWP will continue to provide such services, as budgeting allows, and will continue to find new ways to serve our members and attendees by providing affordable conference services. AWP received 30 comments that the conference itself was too expensive. We are always careful to consider expenses we have direct control over when considering the conference. The cost for registration and bookfair space is calculated in such a way to primarily enable AWP to cover the expense of hotel space, staff time, exhibit setup, decorating, and other significant expenditures necessitated by hosting such a large conference. Though these prices are fall below the normal costs of a professional conference of equal size, AWP is always careful to consider how each fee is best put to use to further support our attendees. AWP understands, particularly in light of the growing economic crisis, many of our members’ budgets were stretched thin by visiting Chicago. We are happy to report that according to our survey results more people received funding to attend this year’s conference than last year’s. Though AWP does recognize travel budgets and institutional support are currently being questioned at many colleges and universities, and we will keep this in mind as we negotiate future hotel contracts to ensure we are getting the best rates possible for our members. AWP received 41 comments saying the conference should not be held in the winter or is held too early in the year. Some respondents seemed dubious as to the reason these dates were chosen for both Chicago and New York. AWP chooses dates for the conference that enable us to secure the cheapest possible hotel rates for our members while we avoid conflicts with holy days. AWP received 10 comments inquiring why the conference rarely goes to the west coast. The hotel rates offered to AWP on the west coast have so far been too high (over $200 per night), for our members. It should be noted that even in mid-March, in warmer areas on the southeast and the west coast, the task of negotiating discount rates for attendees becomes more difficult because either there is not an off-season rate, or the off-season rate is six months later than our conference can take place. This makes cities like Miami, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and San Diego difficult to take the conference to. In order to take AWP to the west coast, we may, once again have to contract with a second or third tier city, such as Anaheim or Sacramento. The west coast is a very difficult area to receive good hotel and convention center rates. Even a smaller city like Seattle demands top dollar during our conference season. We are currently looking to bring the conference to the west coast for 2014. We are pleased that next year’s conference will be held in Denver in April 2010 when the average high temperature will be in the low 60s. AWP received 40 comments that there were not enough academic, craft-of-writing, or pedagogical events at the 2009 conference. We received 29 comments saying there were not enough variety to the panels. There were less than 12 comments each saying there were not enough panels on fiction, poetry, non-fiction, playwriting/screenwriting, and publishing. There were less than 7 comments each saying there were not enough panels on cross-genre, avant-garde, and multi-media issues. AWP developed a system of modules to ensure there is a balance between all the many issues and topics that interest our constituents. Over the past few conferences the gap between poetry and other genres has been closing. An increased number of fiction and nonfiction events at the conference is no doubt a result of an effort to develop more quality featured prose events. Still the number of accepted fiction and nonfiction proposals remains somewhat disproportional to the number of poetry events, even after improvement. Simply, AWP receives fewer fiction and nonfiction event proposals, and a dismally low number of pedagogical, craft, cross-genre, playwriting/screenwriting, and publishing proposals. If we are to maintain the increasing of the number of writers interested in these events joining us at the conference we cannot rely on such submissions to be made without AWP prompting. In 2005 the number of prose event proposal submission shot up due to the AWP Board’s efforts to solicit prose proposals from colleagues, universities, and list serves. Because AWP is constantly looking for panels that are diverse, unique, and wide ranging as our membership, such practices, and additional solicitations directly to AWP’s large constituency would continue to prove beneficial. AWP received 29 comments discussing the lack of variety in presenters in regards to wanting more lesser known presenters, to wanting younger presenters, or to having more of these people participate as headliners. We received 13 comments saying there were not enough events centered on diversity issues. The expansion of the conference from 16 events in the 1990s to over 330 events today has drastically improved the variety of aesthetic view points, ethnic diversity, and the support we provide to AWP members at all stages of their careers. AWP has worked very hard to diversify its conference programming. Typically, event discussions and readings centered on diversity issues and minority participants receive special consideration in the review of proposals. At the 2008 conference in New York 68 of the 300 events (23%) were focused on African-American, Asian and Asian-American, Latino/a, Feminist, Gay, Lesbian, Transgender, and other diversity issues important to AWP’s constituencies. By comparison, 71 of the 330 events (24%) at this year’s conference in Chicago focused on diversity issues. Traditional or popular programming in tandem with alternative, diverse, and innovative programming is what has taken the AWP Conference from a small, intimate gathering of little interest to the outside world, to a major professional convention of writers, students, teachers editors and other publishing professionals that draws national and international attention. AWP will continue to seek ways to bring the highest quality program to our broad and growing constituency. AWP’s events and participants should be representative of AWP’s far-flung membership. Similarly to fiction and nonfiction events, AWP will continue to play a more active role in soliciting and encouraging such proposals in order to have more diverse representation among event topics. AWP is constantly looking for panels that are as diverse, unique, and wide ranging as our constituency. We want nothing more than to have panelists that best reflect the diverse community we represent. The committee made up of AWP Board and Staff Members who select the panelschanges each year so the selection can vary (pretty wildly in some cases) from year to year. Over the years this committee has been pretty diverse and comprised of people of all kinds of different ethnic groups, sexual orientations, ages, beliefs, and genre interests. The selections do not have anything to do with prejudice, but much like with the editor of a press or journal it’s hard to question someone's person opinion of quality. Of course, that certainly doesn't mean the committee feels the panels they reject are not of a high quality. Each year the committee laments the difficulty of their decisions. Each year we receive over 700 panel proposals. Because of space considerations we can only accept around 330. What this means is that many high quality panels have to be left off the schedule. We do not take this lightly and will continue to vet the panels in as transparent, honest, and serious a way as possible. AWP considers the bookfair to be one of the most important aspects of the conference and this is consistently mirrored in our survey where it ranks as something that is very important to our attendees. AWP received 38 comments concerning the flow of traffic through the bookfair. Additionally, we know some bookfair exhibitors wonder about the rationale for placement at the bookfair. Bookfair exhibitors were lucky this year that the exhibit space afforded to us by the hotel, unlike in New York, was all located on one floor, which made it easier for attendees to navigate between halls. Specifically, in terms of the foot traffic there was some concern about the Southeast Hall. As AWP travels from location to location each year we know that all exhibit space is not created equally. From year to year there will be more desirable elements to the exhibit space in one location and less desirable elements in another. In order to provide exhibit space in Chicago at a reasonable cost to the organizations we serve, AWP used the space available at the Hilton Chicago. The space was much more easily navigated compared to the 2008 conference, and had the square footage to comfortably hold the number of exhibits necessary to serve our large number of exhibitors. In preparation for each bookfair, AWP is always careful to consult our show company and the hotel about the best way to set up and to determine which halls naturally get the best flow of traffic based on the design of the floor. Based on their experience working in the Hilton Chicago, and AWP’s experience from years of running the bookfair, it was known the Southeast Hall would get some of the best traffic because they were the exhibit hall closest to the main entrances on the floor. While this obviously does not take into account attendees searching out individual exhibitors, we did know that heavy traffic would have to come through the entrances in the Southeast Hall because a large number of people would have to enter and leave though the Southeast in order to get to other areas of the bookfair. While the design of the bookfair is not an exact science, we will always accommodate bookfair booths with what is thought of as the best space possible as we did for the first time this year. We will also continue to separate booths from tables and give the booths prime placement over tables. This will be best reflected in the setup for the 2010 Bookfair in Denver where, because we will occupy a single room of 105,000 square feet of contiguous space, all the booths will be place up front near the main entrance to the hall and all of the tables will be placed behind them. As we move from location to location, we will continue to face different challenges with our exhibit and meeting space. AWP will do it’s best to face those challenges and adequately serve our exhibitors and attendees to the best of our ability. One thing never changes from exhibit hall to exhibit hall: not all placement is created equal. The best and worst placement of booths and tables is always relative to primary entrances, corner units, etc. Regardless of the exhibit hall, there is always an area that simply does not get as much foot-traffic as other areas do. In order to maximize the traffic in those areas, AWP offers concessions in the less desirable space to lure attendees to that area. The concessions in Chicago were subsidized by AWP, in order to cover minimum purchases required by the hotel. AWP is happy to provide this service in order to maximize the foot-traffic in otherwise slow areas of exhibit halls. AWP has always used and will continue to use ethical means to place exhibitors in the hall. For that reason AWP has created the “Point Placement System,” which informs exhibitors of the method by which tables and booths will be placed in an easy and straightforward way. To accommodate the fairest method of placement, the date of purchase will be the primary means of determining placement for the 2010 bookfair, and other “free” means of earning points have been included such as earning point from consecutive years of participation. As the Bookfair has grown, the necessity for an exhibitor survey has increased. Exhibitor concerns should be broken out of the survey results in the future, so that we can better address exhibitor concerns, and better determine the quality of the conference overall from an attendee perspective. Exhibitors’ need and preferences are generally very different from those of most attendees. AWP continues to do it’s very best to make the best use of the space available to us, but we should be prepared each year to face the challenges that come with a location, and to take advantage of the benefits that come with each location’s exhibit space. By many accounts the 2010 Bookfair in the Colorado Convention Center, with 105,000 square feet of contiguous space in a modern facility, will provide for the best venue we’ve ever had. AWP received 8 comments saying we need to do more to support “green” initiatives at the conference. Some of these comments mentioned that the distribution of the conference program and tote bag is ecologically irresponsible. In an effort to reduce AWP’s footprint on the planet as much as possible, this year we made arrangements to have the program printed from wood sources from well-managed forests and 25% recycled/post-consumer fiber. To have the program printed this way was done at a considerable expense to AWP, but we think it was worth it to help further “green” initiatives among large conferences. While we do understand that some attendees view the tote bag as unnecessary, we also know that many appreciate it for its convenient use both at the conference and well after. AWP does not view the complimentary tote bags as a one-time use item and we strongly advocate for them not to be wasted. The bag itself is recyclable, and we know many conference attendees use it as a beach bag, diaper bag, or year-round book bag. Use of both the program and the tote bag are optional, and further, because we tend to run out of them each year, we prefer to only distribute them to attendees who give them their full use. AWP has also begun to consider the “green” initiatives of the hotels we use for the conference. The Hilton Chicago this year, and next year’s venues at the Hyatt Regency Denver and Colorado Convention Center, have all made great efforts to reduce their consumption of valuable resources. As the importance of such partnerships has become undeniable, AWP will continue to explore the best ways to partner with these kinds of venues when possible. AWP received very few commented on the lack of seating and the lack of a communal area, as well as the lack of a designated lunch hour and/or breaks. The issue of seating can be easily solved in 2010 by using a smaller session room or part of the exhibit space as a general communing area, with banquet tables, chairs, and water stations. The room could be labeled in the program’s floor plan as an attendee “lounge” so that individuals know that they may visit this room at any time to meet people or relax. Some felt that not enough break time was allowed between sessions for socializing, while others felt that a designated time needed to be made for lunch. Attendees may take breaks whenever they would like, and while it is unfortunate that a panel discussion may be taking place at the same time a person would like to have lunch, it would be unwise to bring back the lunch break, or increase the break time between events. Increasing the break between sessions would require eliminating an entire time slot of events from our schedule, and that would force us to include fewer events on the schedule—and one of our biggest compliments is the variety of sessions. Similarly, bringing back the lunch break would require eliminating a time slot, but more so, because of the size of the conference, the standard lunch break caused overwhelming crowding, bottlenecking, pushing, and general mayhem when all attendees exit meeting rooms at once, jetting for the front door or nearest hotel vendor. Eliminating the lunch break was a practical move to open up a time slot and to eliminate the mass exodus from meeting rooms that overwhelmed vendors even more than we do now.
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2009 Survey Report
