SIMPLIFY THE COMPLICATED SO THAT YOU MAY SHARE IT WITH EVERYONE

This conference is set up for those who feel comfortable expressing their thoughts and research in a multidisciplinary setting. In contrast, in the traditional academic conference format, where most of the delegates hail from the same discipline, researchers seek to demonstrate how they incrementally advanced knowledge in their field. As a result, presentations tend to be highly specialized in nature, interspersed with jargon, symbols and technical terms unique to the discipline. 

This structure and style of presentation falters in a multidisciplinary conference setting where a high percentage of the conference attendees lack the expertise and knowledge of the presenter.    As a result, presentations in a multidisciplinary conference should be modified and simplified to ensure that   the audience gains an appreciation for the speakers’ contribution.  Formal presentations utilizing  specific methods, analytics, language and scholarly references are more than likely to serve as a barrier to communication,  given that most members of the audience are not familiar with the  discipline. If you have never participated in a multidisciplinary conference, take a look at the format used by speakers in TED conferences. The speakers at TED do an excellent job in cutting across different segments in their audience and getting the message through to everyone by avoiding unnecessary jargon. They pounce on the most sophisticated insights and research and simplify them in communicating with the audience. This is what we professors are supposed to do in class in teaching our students. The challenge is to do the same thing in our multidisciplinary conferences. In the age of mass media, those who can't communicate, can't teach. And statistics show that they can't get their online research readers to go past the abstract, much less the first page. If you care to simplify in your communications, your story may be about to begin.

RESEARCH EXCHANGE

MYTH 1: Conferences create future research partnerships inside the conference halls. False! Studies show that very little interaction occurs within the halls. According to one study, the ones who are more likely to interact are the smoking faculty who congregate outside.

listening to research

MYTH 2: Faculty go to conferences to listen to research presentations. Partially false. In Western conferences faculty are free to roam about as they please. Casinos are a big attraction and temptation. Our bus tours compete with the casinos in the quest for the faculty's time and intellect.

conference format

MYTH 3: The traditional conference format will continue to dominate. False! You may get your research from the internet but the internet isn't everything in research. Meet researchers in a personal setting. At IJAS you break the ice and build relationships within "the last 3 feet of communication."

Source: What is Wrong with the Outdated Vision of the Now in Academia

cultural bus tours Overview

Although the research presentations will last 5 days, most participants would look forward to something beyond the presentations. In parallel with the presentations, each conference delegate that registers for the 5-day conference is entitled to two free bus tours. Each tour results in a unique experience that blends the area's history, tourism and multiculturalism as the delegates get to know each other during the bus tour events. Given that the delegates hail from various disciplines, there is always something new to learn for the intellectually curious. 

FOR THE BUS TOURS, OUR BUSES WILL PICK UP DELEGATES FROM THREE CASINO HOTELS: (i) SILVER SEVENS (NEAR UNLV), (ii) CIRCUS CIRCUS, AND (iii) EXCALIBUR.

red rock canyon tour (18 March 2020)

Our first visit will be to the Spring Mountain Ranch State Park, located west of Las Vegas in the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area. The many springs in these mountains provided water for Paiute Indians and later brought mountain men and settlers into the area. The Ranch is a 520-acre oasis.

We will then proceed to the Red Rock Loop home of the (i) Calico Hills, (ii) Limestone Indian roasting pits, and (iii) the petroglyphs at Willow Springs.

We will have a free buffet, and end our tour experience at Freemont Street, the second most famous street in Las Vegas after the Strip. This is where many famous casinos such as Binion's Horseshoe and Golden Nugget made their name. It was the abundance of neon signs, like cowboy Vegas Vic, that earned the street the nickname Glitter Gulch.

GRAND CANYON WEST TOUR (19 MARCH 2020)

Owned and operated by the Hualapai Indian Tribe, Grand Canyon West provides an opportunity to connect with nature and explore the West Rim of the Grand Canyon from top to bottom. Delegates will be able to soak in nature's beauty at their own pace after the tour bus drops us at the entrance to the canyon and a hop-on hop-off shuttle takes over for departure to the various viewpoints including the Hualapai Ranch, Eagle Point and Guano Point.

We will walk 4,000 feet above the Grand Canyon on the horeshoe-shaped glass bridge. In the old days, the most thrilling view one could get of the Grand Canyon came standing at its edge. In 2007, that view got even better with the opening of the Skywalk. This 10-foot wide bridge extends 70 feet out over the rim of the Canyon. Look down and you can see right through the glass platform, an engineering marvel which offers unparalleled views of one of the world's Seven Natural Wonders. 

Each IJAS multidisciplinary conference follows the same format. Here are our research presentation programs from recent conferences at Harvard (click here) and UNLV (click here).

Our editorial board invites abstracts, papers, and proposals as long as they fall within one of the following broad tracks:

• Social Sciences and Humanities

• Business and Economics

• Teaching and Education

• Science and Technology

After the submissions are accepted by the reviewers, in a double-blind review process, they will be clustered around their common topics and areas of interest. As is typical of multidisciplinary conferences, the final program - released about three weeks before the conference - will mirror the research agendas of the delegates rather than a pre-conceived list of arbitrary topics.

It is up to each delegate how much to submit or publish. Some authors may publish only an abstract in the proceedings. Others may prefer to publish a full-length manuscript in the journal. Many will publish nothing at all. Delegates may also attend without presenting any research.

Authors may deliver their work during the conference either as a 15-minute oral presentation or as a poster.

The most important dates to remember for the conference are as follows:

• The conference will run from 16 to 20 March 2020.

• Email your manuscript formatted in line with this template to ManuscriptSubmission@gmail.com after the conference, up to 1 July 2020.

• The proceedings and journals will be published in late December 2020.

Within a few days of receiving your online abstract submission, we will notify you of the reviewers' acceptance or rejection, for the conference.

If we inform you that it is an acceptance and you would like to publish your research, follow the model format here and email us your formatted abstract or full manuscript in Microsoft Word. 

Abstracts and summarized articles will be published in the proceedings entitled Conference of the International Journal of Arts and Sciences, in electronic format (ISSN 1943-6114).

Full length manuscripts may be published in the International Journal of Arts and Sciences (ISSN 1944-6934) or any of the refereed journals electronically available through IJAS' publishing consortium. The review process for the journals is slower and more demanding in its standards. Although both the proceedings and journals are refereed, research that meets the refereed standards for the conference and the proceedings may not meet the refereed standards for the journals. The selection of a journal, if any, for a particular manuscript is entirely at the discretion of the editorial board members following the reviewers' suggestions.

All the journals and proceedings are in electronic format since this makes it easier to disseminate the articles (click here for a sample article) to international scholars.

Authors will receive complimentary access to the online issue in which their work appears. One's research may not simultaneously appear in both our proceedings and journals.

Authors who prefer a hard copy may download an entire issue on their own computer and publish and order a hard copy of it from Lulu.com or any other online publishing service for their own personal use.

IJAS's articles are indexed/accessed in (i) WorldCat, (ii) Ulrich's serials directory, (iii) Proquest, (iv) EBSCO, (v) Genamics, and (vi) Google Scholar - click here.

There is no page limit on articles. We don't impose a financial penalty on lengthy manuscripts. We don't charge any money to publish in our refereed proceedings or journals. We never did and never will. We also do not accept manuscripts that have been edited by third parties for a fee. 

You may republish any articles you publish with us. You don't need our permission to do so. Third parties, however, cannot republish articles that have been published with us unless they have the authors' written consent.

No lodging facilities are available on the UNLV campus during the academic year. However, Las Vegas has plenty of hotels. To extract the lowest room rates, we recommend two particular sources. We recommend that in your hotel search you stay focused on Las Vegas Boulevard's (a.k.a., the Strip) major hotels. The cheapest major hotel on the Strip is usually Circus Circus. The only complaint we have heard from our delegates about this hotel is that although it's on the Strip, it's not in the heart of the Strip. Hence, the distance could be inconvenient. We also recommend our favorite booking website is booking.com.  

For a map of the Strip, click here. 

For the shortest distance from the Strip to campus, you may proceed by walk (if you are a very good walker) from where the Strip intersects Flamingo Avenue or Tropicana Avenue. Way beyond the Strip and the tourists, the closest casino and hotel to our conference location is the Silver Sevens Hotel & Casino. At Silver Sevens and other "nearby" hotels to the campus (click here), the lodging is still a considerable distance from the conference location. And far from the Strip where all the Vegas action is. This is why we strongly recommend lodging at the casinos on the Strip. Ideally find a hotel between Circus Circus and Luxor. This stretch is very safe, the action never stops, and you may walk freely and enjoy yourself into the night. 

It doesn't matter as much where you stay on the Strip as long as your location is in the vicinity of the Monorail and tram stops. The two systems between them cover most parts of the Strip. Read information about the Monorail and tram connections.

FOR THE BUS TOURS, OUR BUSES WILL PICK UP DELEGATES FROM THREE CASINO HOTELS: (i) SILVER SEVENS (NEAR UNLV), (ii) CIRCUS CIRCUS, AND (iii) EXCALIBUR.
 

There are several airlines with direct connection to McCarran International Airport (LAS) in Las Vegas.

Group shuttles are an economical way to get from the airport to most major hotel/resorts. While en route, group shuttles make multiple stops at locations along the way, so relax and enjoy the spectacular view. Expect anything in Las Vegas.

Vegas is the wedding capital of America and even professors who have just arrived in the United States can be married in Las Vegas regardless of their visa status. Whether you've been planning for this moment since you were 12-years-old or you make your decision shortly after landing at McCarran with your research presentation notes in your hands, we have one tip for anyone getting married in Las Vegas that will help make planning the big day a little easier. Please keep us and the refereed process out of it.

Who Needs a Visa

Applying for an American visa to participate in an IJAS Conference

The B is a nonimmigrant visa for persons desiring to enter the US temporarily for business (B-1) or pleasure (B-2).

B-1 visitors for “business”

The B-1 visa permits persons to come to the US to engage in short-term, temporary professional activities related to their employment abroad; for example, consulting with peers, participating in conferences or seminars, lecturing or speaking, training, and independent research that provides no benefit to a US institution. B-1 visitors for business are admitted to the US for the period of time needed to complete the purpose of the trip. To show eligibility for B-1 or WB status, the applicant must provide to the US consular officer abroad and/or immigration officer at the port of entry evidence documenting the purpose of the trip (e.g., a copy of the conference letter of acceptance), intent to depart the US (copy of round-trip air ticket), and source and amount of funding.

B-2 visitors for “pleasure”

The B-2 visa permits persons to come to the US for activities of a recreational character. Cohabitating partners and extended family members (e.g., elderly parents) who are ineligible for derivative status on other visas (e.g., H-4, F-2, J-2) may qualify for a B-2 visa. B-2 visitors for pleasure are generally admitted for 6 months, regardless of whether the intended length of stay is shorter than 6 months. To show eligibility for B-2 or WT status, the applicant should be prepared to provide a “what, when and where” agenda. If the visitor is coming to visit a friend or relative in the US, a letter of invitation is expected from the inviting party. IJAS doesn't legally qualify as a friend or relative and can't be an inviting party. Additionally, the visitor will need to show evidence of funding, return transportation, and ties to the home country.

Requirements

There are specific requirements which must be met by applicants to qualify for a visitor visa under U.S. immigration law. The consular officer at the U.S. Embassy or Consulate will determine whether you qualify for the visa. The required presumption under U.S. law is that every visitor visa applicant is an intending immigrant until they demonstrate otherwise. Therefore, applicants for visitor visas must overcome this presumption by demonstrating:

• That the purpose of their trip is to enter the United States temporarily for business or pleasure;

• That they plan to remain for a specific, limited period;

• Evidence of funds to cover expenses in the United States;

• That they have a residence outside the United States as well as other binding ties that will ensure their departure from the United States at the end of the visit.

Applicants for visitor visas should generally apply at the nearest U.S. Embassy or Consulate in the country where they live. It is important to apply for a visa well in advance of the travel departure date. Completing Form DS-160, Online Nonimmigrant Visa Application, is the first step in the visa application process. After you have submitted Form DS- 160, print the confirmation page and take it to your interview. Next, pay the non-refundable visa application fee, if you are required to pay it before your interview. Then, make an appointment for an interview at the U.S. Embassy or Consulate where you pay to apply for your visa. You can learn how to schedule an appointment for an interview, pay the application processing fee, review embassy-specific instructions, and much more by visiting the website of the U.S. Embassy or Consulate where you will be applying at usembassy.gov. The wait time for an interview appointment for applicants can vary, so early application is strongly encouraged. Visa wait times for interview appointments and visa processing times for each U.S. Embassy or Consulate are available on travel.state.gov and on most U.S. Embassy or Consulate websites. During the visa application process, an ink-free, digital fingerprint scan will be taken. Some visa applications require further administrative processing, which takes additional time after the visa applicant’s interview by a Consular Officer. For information about required documentation and fees, please visit travel.state.gov.

Unless canceled or revoked, a visa is valid until its expiration date. If your passport expires, you may use the valid visa for travel and admission to the United States along with your new valid passport containing the same biographic data. Do not remove the visa page; instead carry both passports together.

Visa Waiver Program

The Visa Waiver Program (VWP) enables citizens of participating countries to travel to the US for business or tourism for 90 days without obtaining a B-1 or B-2 visa. Those entering for business purposes are admitted in WB status (equivalent to B-1) and those entering for purposes of pleasure are admitted in WT status (equivalent to B-2).

Under the Visa Waiver Program (VWP), nonimmigrant travellers must have an approved travel authorization from the Department of Homeland Security’s Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA). To comply with ESTA, VWP travelers must provide electronically to US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) the information previously collected on the I-94W Nonimmigrant Alien Arrival/Departure (Form I-94W) and receive authorization to travel before embarking to the United States.  Department of Homeland Security recommends that ESTA applications be submitted no less than 72 hours prior to travel. Apply for travel authorization under ESTA here. Travel authorization under ESTA remains valid for the lesser of two years or the validity of your current passport.

Procedures for entering the US in WB or WT status are the same as listed above for persons entering in B-1 or B-2 status, except that the requirement of obtaining a visa at a US consulate is waived. Additionally, they must have a return ticket to a foreign destination other than Canada or Mexico or adjacent islands, and have a machine-readable passport. Entry to the US at a land border from Canada or Mexico is permitted.

Visa Waiver Program participating countries include Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brunei, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Republic of Korea, San Marino, Singapore, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom (“United Kingdom” refers only to British citizens who have the unrestricted right of permanent abode in the UK).

Visitors entering the US under the VWP are admitted for a period of 90 days. VWP entrants cannot apply for an extension of stay or change of status. If they wish to obtain another nonimmigrant status, they must exit the US and return with a visa in the desired category.

Around the turn of the century, in Rhode Island, a group of Bryant College professors from different departments would frequently meet for lunch, sharing ideas over a Sodexo meal. The members of this group included Pat Keeley, Pedro Beade and Glen Camp. Pat, known for his Irish wit and resonant voice, would frequently remark sarcastically that a new international journal, a multidisciplinary one, was needed to record the group’s thoughts. Nobody would think anything of Pat’s tongue in cheek comment but the eccentric and affable Glen Camp, a multilinguist who had spent the early years of his career as a policy director for the U.S. State Department in Europe, would each time raise his glass and reply “Superbe! Magnifique!” At first it was thought that Camp was acting theatrically in jest but it soon became apparent that he was obsessed by the remark that Keeley would generously repeat over time, if for nothing else, to elicit the predictable reply. A Harvard alumnus and Fulbright scholar, Camp was the founder of the Rhode Island branch of Amnesty International, and he saw in open and multidisciplinary communications a catalyst for international education and harmony across geographical boundaries. He envisioned how a journal of this nature could promote study abroad programs. Sitting at the same table would be Dean Earl Briden whose pet project at Bryant was to get the faculty to think outside the box. Bryant students had for decades participated in study abroad programs and Dean Briden was actively involved in the extensive documentation of the programs. One may imagine the Dean’s generous words of encouragement to Camp. This led Camp to prod Pedro Beade for advice about securing funding for the journal and academic conferences. As a board member of the Rhode Island Committee for the Humanities, Beade was an expert in grant writing and had the right connections. Camp was the favorite professor of the international students at Bryant, and Beade who had been raised in Cuba believed in Camp’s vision.

This was an exciting time at Bryant. The college was on the verge of becoming a university and a major campus expansion would soon be undertaken. As so often happens in such situations involving change, other concepts took a backseat and the idea of a multidisciplinary journal that couldn't fit readily in any one department could at first elicit only a very narrow support. Yet from a small seed a tree would grow.

The International Journal of Arts & Sciences (IJAS) was officially registered as a double-blind refereed journal in 2005. The first issue was published one year later in hard-copy format thanks to the creative writings of Rocio Dresser (San Diego State University), Jerry Galloway (Georgia Southern), Kristin Reddington-Bennett (Wake Forest University), and Sylvia Nassar-McMillan (North Carolina State University), among others. Each issue was driven by a call for papers.

By 2008, some of the initial Bryant faculty had assumed new responsibilities or joined other universities. A few others had passed away or retired. Among those who were now teaching elsewhere was Joseph Bonnici, a professor active in study abroad programs.

In 2008, Bonnici was asked to facilitate major changes at IJAS and to extend the organization's outreach beyond American academia. Sticking closely to Camp's philosophical blueprint, IJAS formally became an organizer of conferences promoting study abroad programs. The multidisciplinary content of the research remained the same but the format changed from a “traditional American" to an "international study abroad” format. IJAS also started disseminating its articles in electronic format, thereby increasing its articles’ access across the world. Over fifteen professors in the Connecticut State University (CSU) system including Henry Greene, Khoon Koh, Carlos F. Liard-Muriente, and Bonnici himself have been instrumental in coordinating IJAS' conferences. If Bryant College was the cradle of the IJAS multidisciplinary movement, the Connecticut State University system has been its spiritual home. The CSU Board of Regents' emphasis on "affordable education" in its mission statement has had an influence on the value for money that delegates experience through the conferences.

In line with the above developments, IJAS' editorial board actively solicits international research. IJAS' articles are indexed or accessed in (i) WorldCat, (ii) Ulrich's serials directory, (iii) Index Copernicus, (iv) ProQuest, (v) Genamics, (vi) EBSCO, and (vii) Google Scholar - click here. The high quality of the research is due to the dedicated reviewers.

Over the last few years, widespread cuts in university budgets have led to the demise of many excellent research programs and projects on American campuses. When the University of Nevada Las Vegas (UNLV) started closing down entire departments and projects due to lack of funding, IJAS ended up acquiring a number of refereed publications on condition that it would offer them for free to the general public for a set number of years. 

Trying to explain the IJAS experience over all these years to those who have spent a lifetime attending traditional, single-discipline conferences confined within four walls is like trying to explain the laptop to a 1960's typist chugging at her typewriter in her cubicle. IJAS owes its success instead to a burgeoning generation of professors who are internationally mobile and eager to explore beyond the confines of their discipline and geographical base. The mind, once expanded to the dimensions of larger ideas, never returns to its original size. Taken to its fullest, the IJAS experience is fatal to silo mentalities. At IJAS', there is always something new to do and learn. To those who prefer a traditional, single-discipline conference, they could still experience this at IJAS by narrowing the type of papers they attend to and skipping the cultural programs. Like a study abroad program, an IJAS conference is what one makes it. There are students who take their study abroad program seriously, actively trying to comprehend and close the cultural divide. And there are those who can't wait for the opportunity to get drunk. As one University of Cincinnati professor put it upon attending the IJAS conference in Prague, if a delegate presents a paper and leaves, the experience is no different than if one did the same thing at a bigger conference such as the American Psychological Association's. She then described what it was like to listen to a wide variety of presentations at the IJAS conference:

The American presenters [were] highly energetic and data driven about helping low income NYC students... The Polish presenter had highly multicolored slides about how the sounds of poetry make us happy. The German presenter and the Romanian presenter [spoke] about theology. The grad student in English studies read a paper full of whimsical self disclosure about reading Mrs. Dalloway in the tub. An Israeli Buddhist gave a moving account of his moment of enlightenment in the Judean desert. Having such variety in culture, kinds of questions being asked, and styles of presentations is an experience of widening the world that would not occur in discipline specific situations. This pulls you out of your silo if you let it.