Call for Nominations

The International Society of the Learning Sciences (ISLS)
Early Career Award
Due: May 1, 2020

1. Nominees for the 2020 award must have earned a Ph.D. or equivalent degree after January 1, 2011 (within 9 years of the year of nomination).
2. Scholars may be nominated more than once and can only receive the award once.
3. Nominees must have been a member (full or student) at least one year of the last 3 years from the date of submission (i.e., since April 1, 2017) or demonstrate some other connection to ISLS, as described in the nomination letter.

Evaluation Criteria: Successful nominees will have demonstrated a notable contribution to the learning sciences and the potential for future contributions.

While service and active participation in the ISLS community indicates the relevance of the nominee’s work to the field, the nominee’s scholarly contribution will be the primary consideration in the deliberation.

1. Notable learning science contributions are interpreted broadly to include one of any of the following:

• Research excellence
• Innovation
• Impact on pressing social, political, and ethical concerns

2. Potential for future contributions, such as:

• Service to the Society
• Vision for the field
• Impact on other fields, academic communities, and under-served regions of the world

Nomination Materials:

The International Society of the Learning Sciences (ISLS) extends the deadline for proposals to host future ISLS Annual Meetings due to COVID-19. The new deadline will be announced later. If you have any questions, please contact Oskar Lindwall, ISLS Conference chair at [email protected].

We hope you are staying healthy and safe during these challenging times!

Dear colleagues,

We are in challenging and uncertain times. Many of us are anxious about the whirlwind of events related to COVID-19 and its effects on our families and communities. We hope that you and yours are well and able to take all of the necessary precautions to stay healthy.

From the ICQE Planning committee:

We are pleased to announce that the CFP is now available for the Second International Conference on Quantitative Ethnography (ICQE20), which will take place 24-27 October 2020 at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, USA.

Many researchers in the Learning Sciences come from around the world to present their research at the annual conferences hosted by the International Society of the Learning Sciences (ISLS) and participate in critical discussions around the state-of-the-art of the field. However, as a society, we recognize that our Learning Sciences community is wider than those who attend annual meetings. This program grows out of many requests that the society has received to support regional or affinity group activities.

The ISLS Regional and Affinity Outreach Grants Program seeks to support the growth of regional communities of learning scientists and communities of scholars who are engaging in research that is germane and synergistic to the Learning Sciences but are currently underrepresented in ISLS. Through this grants program, we seek to provide opportunities for community building, knowledge sharing and consolidation, collaboration and cross-pollination. We seek to increase mutual awareness between ISLS and other communities with synergistic interests and expertise.

JLS will have a new lay-out that the publisher has already implemented for some other journals. This change applies to all new accepted articles.

The biggest change is the introduction of structured abstracts for regular and special issue articles (not Reports and Reflections). From now the structured abstract should be less than 200 words and have the following elements: Background, Methods, Findings, and Contribution. We hope that structured abstracts will help bring out the significance of the paper. "Background" can help to link the article to previous work in the field of the learning sciences and beyond it. "Contribution" goes beyond a conclusion based on empirical findings to what the article adds to the literature (i.e., why would future research refer to the findings? What are the implications).

We are happy to announce the International Learning Sciences Student Association (ILSSA) as a formal committee of the International Society of the Learning Sciences (ISLS). The association aims to serve as an international community for all students of the learning sciences. ILSSA’s mission is to support and develop the intellectual, social, and professional development of graduate and undergraduate students in the field of learning sciences and within ISLS.

 The goals of ILSSA include:

As previously announced, the International Society of the Learning Sciences is searching for the new Editor(s) of Journal of the Learning Sciences (JLS) for 2021–2024. We are extending the deadline for letters of intent to February 17, 2020. Please see the remainder of the updated request for proposals below. 

Applications will be welcomed either by an individual for the position of sole Editor or by a team for the position of Co-Editors. JLS is a leading international journal and as such applications are encouraged from members of ISLS from any nation. The position provides the person(s) chosen, as well as the host institution(s), with international visibility in the learning sciences. Letters of intent to apply are due February 17, 2020, and full proposals are due March 15, 2020, as described in the call below. You can download a PDF version of the call at: http://www.isls.org/news.

The goal of the ISLS conference travel scholarship is to support scientists in the field of the learning sciences who live and work in regions of the world that are not represented at our annual conferences (i.e., ICLS and CSCL) to attend the conference. At the moment, we have significant gaps in membership from African, and Central and South American countries. We also have underrepresentation in some southern European countries where we know that learning sciences programs exist. ISLS will put its priority on the support for scientists from the underrepresented regions. However, the society will also consider the possibility of the support for scientists who may be affected by conditions that make their travels difficult to the conference site, if the funding is available.

To increase the diversity of the Society’s membership, we are soliciting applications for a conference scholarship to be awarded to successful applicants in the amount of $500 - $1500.

We're thrilled that the special issue for 2020 already has been published. "Situating Data Science: Exploring how Relationships to Data Shape Learning" Edited by Michelle Wilkerson and Joe Polman. Read at https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/hlns20/29/1?nav=tocList 

Each year scores of learning scientists volunteer to donate their time and energy to reviewing the scholarship of their peers for JLS. These reviews are the labor that gives the journal its value to the field, and that enable the community to continue to grow and redefine itself over time. JLS prides itself on providing reviews that are thorough and constructive, that hold up scholarly standards while inviting newcomers into the intellectual community. We sincerely appreciate the contributions of all of the scholars who have provided reviews for JLS over the last year.

As noted by the editorial team at JLS, there are always some reviewers who go above and beyond the expected commitment. Sometimes that is in the form of putting in extra effort to mentor a junior scholar with support and explanation to scaffold the process of authoring a journal manuscript. Sometimes it takes the form of providing reviews that are not only thorough but also timely. Sometimes a reviewer who has already completed multiple reviews for the journal will agree to do just one more review, despite the press of many other commitments. These acts of generosity and collegial dedication are generally invisible to all but the members of the editorial team. There is a solid core of such reviewers for JLS, and each year some new ones emerge.

The International Society for the Learning Sciences (ISLS) invites proposals from organizations interested in hosting future ISLS Annual Meetings. These meetings will feature concurrent Learning Sciences and CSCL programs in a joint, annual event. Proposals to host the meeting in 2023 and onwards are solicited from current ISLS members from organizations around the world.

Interested potential organizers are asked to submit a two-page letter of interest that should include a brief statement of the proposed theme for the conference, a range of dates that can be accommodated, strengths of the organizers, advantages of the proposed hosting institution, benefits of the location, and any special opportunities offered by the surrounding areas. Letters of interest must be submitted by March 31, 2020. All letters of interest will be evaluated by the ISLS Conference Committee.

Interested organizations should submit letters of intent to Oskar Lindwall, ISLS Conference Committee chair, at [email protected]. Interested parties are encouraged to contact Oskar Lindwall for more details. NOTE: Only ISLS members in good standing are eligible to submit proposals to host the Society’s Annual Meeting.

The International Society of the Learning Sciences is searching for the new Editor(s) of Journal of the Learning Sciences (JLS) for 2020–2023. Applications will be welcomed either by an individual for the position of sole Editor or by a team for the position of Co-Editors. JLS is a leading international journal and as such applications are encouraged from members of ISLS from any nation. The position provides the person(s) chosen, as well as the host institution(s), with international visibility in the learning sciences. Letters of intent to apply are due February 2, 2020, and full proposals are due March 15, 2020, as described in the call below. You can download a PDF version of the call here: Call-for-New-JLS-Editors

The International Society of the Learning Sciences (ISLS) has concluded the search for a new Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning (ijCSCL). Information about the call can be found here: https://www.isls.org/news/entry/call-for-ijcscl-editor-in-chief). We are happy to announce that Carolyn Rosé (Carnegie Mellon University, US) and Sanna Järvelä (University of Oulu, Finland) will serve as the new co-editors of ijCSCL for 2020-2023. 

The incoming ijCSCL Editors-in-Chief will begin working with the outgoing Editor-in-Chief (Sten Ludvigsen) and the ijCSCL Executive Editors for transitioning into the position. The first journal issue for which the incoming Editors will be responsible is March 2020.

Many researchers in the Learning Sciences come from around the world to present their research at the annual conferences hosted by the International Society of the Learning Sciences (ISLS) and participate in critical discussions around the state-of-the-art of the field. However, as a society, we recognize that our Learning Sciences community is wider than those who attend annual meetings. This program grows out of many requests that the society has received to support regional or affinity group activities.

The ISLS Regional and Affinity Outreach Grants Program seeks to support the growth of regional communities of learning scientists and communities of scholars who are engaging in research that is germane and synergistic to the Learning Sciences but are currently underrepresented in ISLS. Through this grants program, we seek to provide opportunities for community building, knowledge sharing and consolidation, collaboration and cross-pollination. We seek to increase mutual awareness between ISLS and other communities with synergistic interests and expertise.

Journal of the Learning Sciences is inviting proposals for a special issue, to be published in 2022. Instructions for preparing a proposal are posted on the Instructions to Authors at the publisher’s website, https://tinyurl.com/y9neyuhd. Proposals are due December 2, 2019 and will be peer reviewed by the journal’s editorial leadership team. Submitters of the accepted proposal will be notified in February 2020.

In general, we are interested in proposals on emerging themes in the field. For example, proposals that take up the call for research that has impact on teaching and policymaking that was elaborated in a guest editorial in issue 27 (1); on the intersection of the learning sciences and the future of work; on novel methodological and technological approaches to teaching and learning; on artificial intelligence and learning, and so on. This list is not meant to limit the range of possibilities, but to provide some examples of possible themes. We are interested in receiving proposals that reflect the global membership of the ISLS community. This may include multiple suggested authors, a guest editor, or a discussant from outside of the United States.

What is really known about classroom dialogue? Which aspects are relevant for student learning – and which do not matter?

Join the online conversation with the Cambridge Educational Dialogue Team Christine Howe, Sara Hennessy, Neil Mercer, and panelists - Christa Asterhan, and Antonia Larrain on Nov 13. #JLSWebinar #dialogicteaching #educationaldialogue

Workshop Description

The purpose of the ICLS Early Career Workshop is to provide a high quality learning and networking opportunity for early career researchers doing work related to computer-supported collaborative learning and the learning sciences. Within the workshop, participants will share their research with peers and experienced ICLS researchers serving as mentors. Participants will engage in collaborative inquiry and scholarly discourse to improve their research work and prepare for a future career as a Learning Sciences/CSCL researcher. The Early Career Workshop is open to scholars within 5 years of completing their PhD. Early Career Scholars will be chosen through a competitive application process for participation. Accepted participants are expected to provide a two-page summary of their research for inclusion in the ICLS Proceedings. Depending on availability of funds, there may be support to offset some of the costs of accommodation and registration, as well as travel stipends.

Objectives and Design

The workshop aims at supporting participants in:

• Defining innovative and productive programs of research that lead toward an impressive record of inquiry;
• Focusing learning on high-yield professional activities such as grant-writing, peer editing, and building a publishing trajectory;
• Supporting strong data analysis skills and evidence-based arguments in their research projects; and
• Expanding the professional networks of workshop participants through interactions with other early career scholars, mentors, and journal editors

The ICLS Early Career Workshop will involve a two-day event on June 19-20, 2020, just prior to the 2020 ICLS conference in Nashville, Tennessee, USA. In the workshop, we will focus on collaborative inquiry and scholarly discourse with peers and a panel of experienced faculty serving as mentors.

 Main workshop activities include: