Abstract submission is now closed.

Deadline for submissions: 31 January 2024

Please read all the information below before submitting an abstract 

Important points for submitting an abstract:

• There is no overarching theme for the conference. When submitting an abstract you will need to select up to 2 themes to align your abstract to.
• You will need a BERA account to submit an abstract. You do not need to be a BERA member. Once you have signed in, you will be redirected to the abstract submission page.
• Currently you will not need to submit a full paper for the Conference.
• The conference is fully in person and we will not be accepting any virtual presentations if accepted
• You should receive an email confirmation with a copy of your abstract once your submission has been completed.

Themes

All submissions should indicate the theme which closely relates to the topic when submitting.  BERA reserves the right to reassign your abstract to a different theme than submitted if more relevant for programming purposes. If your paper abstract does not fall within the remits of the listed themes, please email conference@bera.ac.uk and you will be given instructions how to submit.

Themes this year are:

• Professional Education
• Higher Education and Lifelong Learning
• Children and Young People
• Foundational disciplines of Education (sociology, psychology, history and philosophy)
• Curriculum and subject pedagogy
• Digital Technology and Artificial Intelligence
• Comparative and/or International Education
• Theory, methodologies and ethics in Education
• Diversity, Inclusion and Social Justice
• Educational Leadership and Policy
• Educational Assessment and evaluation
• Wellbeing and mental health in education

You will also have the option to select a second theme which relates to one our Special Interest Groups:  www.bera.ac.uk/communities.

Research Ethics

The submitters and authors are responsible for ensuring that ethical issues relating to the research project are identified and brought to the attention of the relevant approval or regulatory body. Approval to undertake the research must be granted before any work requiring approval begins. Ethical issues should be interpreted broadly and may encompass, among other things, relevant codes of practice, the involvement of human participants, tissue or data in research, the use of animals, research that may result in damage to the environment and the use of sensitive economic, social or personal data. The BERA Ethical Guidelines can be found on our website.

AI

While generative AI has the potential to transform aspects of academic life and will be increasingly commonplace, it cannot be considered capable of producing an original piece of research or submission without input from human authors. Generative AI cannot also be held accountable for any errors and, in accordance with COPE guidelines, cannot therefore be listed an author.

BERA expects researchers to always act ethically and with academic integrity. AI must not be used to artificially create or modify core research data. If an individual has used generative AI to create a submission for BERA, this must be acknowledged upon submission. The named researcher is fully responsible for the accuracy of any information and correctly referencing any citations. They must take care to ensure that application of AI-based tools does not lead them to plagiarize, misrepresent or falsify content, or infringe third party rights.

In addition, entering a confidential manuscript or document into an AI programme is a breach of privacy and not admissible. As such, no form of peer review or judging can be executed via an AI tool. Having said that, AI tools could be used in the final preparation of referee reports although this must be acknowledged including specifying what purpose (e.g. to improve language style). Should we identify any undisclosed use of generative AI tools for content generation, BERA reserves the right to take action under the Code of Conduct.

Abstract reviewing

Each abstract is reviewed blindly by two reviewers drawn from BERA/WERA Members, or one of the BERA/WERA Committees.

Reviewing criteria

We welcome volunteers to peer review the abstracts submitted and we rely upon the efforts of our volunteers to ensure we have sufficient capacity to review all abstracts. If you would like to be added to the database please register online.

Symposium:

• Clarity of the focus of the research
• Originality of the symposium proposal
• Rigour and coherence of the symposium and its individual papers
• Significance of the research for education practice, policy or theory

Individual Papers:

• Clarity of the focus of the research
• Originality of the research
• Rigour of the research
• Significance of the research for education practice, policy or theory

Poster

• Clarity of the focus of the research
• Suitability of the format
• Rigour of the research
• Significance of the proposal for practice, policy or theory

Panel Discussion/ Workshop/ Activity:

• Clarity of the focus of the research
• Suitability of the session format
• Rigour of the research
• Significance of the proposal for practice, policy or theory

n.b. WERA abstracts will include the addition of “world-wide focus”. WERA submissions will also not include workshops or activities as submission types.

Results

There is limited space on the programme and sessions available at the conference. Each year we are mindful that presenters do not want more sessions as the rooms will not be as full. Therefore there will always be a percentage of papers rejected. In the last few years this is around 30% of papers but it will depend upon the number of abstracts submitted. The Conference & Events Committee continually review the processes to ensure these are fair and transparent.

If the same abstract is submitted under different themes this will only be reviewed once and you will only receive one set of results.

The programme will be published and presenters can check their date and time of presentation if accepted after the early bird deadline, by when all presenters need to register. This is to ensure once the programme is grouped, this consists of confirmed presenters only.

> For individual and poster submissions

• Only one individual abstract will normally be accepted per main presenting author, which will be the highest scoring paper. You can still submit more than one paper.
• Only one presentation style will be accepted for the same abstract
• This does not apply if you are a presenting co-author on other papers
• Similarly this does not apply if you have also been accepted for a symposia or alternative format session

> For symposium submissions

• A minimum of 3 papers and 3 (unique) presenters for each paper need to be registered by the early bird deadline for the symposium to remain in the programme