•    Names and affiliations of the presenters
•    Name and regular-mail address of the primary contact person
•    E-mail address of the contact person
•    Telephone number of the contact person
•    FAX number of the contact person
•    List of upcoming meetings for which you are applying (for example, JMM 2009 only, both JMM 2009 and MathFest 2009, etc.)
•    Is the proposed course a computer lab course? (Note: Participants in computer lab courses must bring their own laptops and software for use during the course.)
•    Is this is a new minicourse or a request to repeat a course that has been given in the past?

The title should succinctly and clearly define the content and purpose of the minicourse.

The minicourse abstract is the only information seen by most MAA members before registration, so it must clearly state the goals and content of the minicourse. In addition, the abstract should describe the course format and any prerequisites, such as specific computer experience. For computer lab courses, the abstract must contain information about what equipment and software the participants will be expected to bring to the course.  Due to space constraints in Focus and in Notices, abstracts must be at most 100 words in length.

This description usually is three to five pages in length. It should include a list of the topics to be covered with the approximate time to be spent on each topic. The proposer’s vision of the discussion of one or two topics should be given in some detail. This information will give the committee a better understanding of the minicourse and will be a primary basis for accepting or rejecting the proposal.

List the special needs for the course, such as overhead projectors, special furniture arrangements, and so on. Presenters are expected to bring their own computer for use in demonstrations. Projection capabilities will be provided by the MAA.

Computer software for the minicourse is the responsibility of the presenter. Trial subscriptions of software like Mathematica and Maple (fully functional software that expires after a fixed amount of time) can be obtained from the software developers for use during the minicourse.

For each presenter, supply one short paragraph that emphasizes the presenter’s experience related to the proposed minicourse. This information will be used to introduce the presenters and probably will be read verbatim.

Please submit an electronic copy of the minicourse proposal to the committee chair:

Jimmy Buchanan
Chair, MAA Committee On Minicourses
buchananvm@hiram.edu.

If the proposal cannot be submitted electronically, it should be mailed to the committee chair:

Professor Jimmy Buchanan
Department of Mathematics
Hiram College
Hiram, OH  44234
330-569-5245.

Proposals for MathFest must be received by the second Tuesday in October in the year preceding the meeting.  For example, proposals for MathFest 2009 are due by Tuesday, October 14, 2008.

Proposals for the Joint Mathematics Meetings must be received by the last Tuesday in December, thirteen months before the meeting.  For example, proposals for JMM 2010 are due by Tuesday, December 30, 2008.

Upon request, proposals that are received at least two months prior to the deadline will be reviewed by the committee, and the proposers will be allowed to submit a revised proposal. The committee will inform proposers at least four months in advance whether or not their proposed minicourse has been accepted for a particular meeting.

The MAA will authorize reimbursement of up to $600 per minicourse for expenses related to presenting the minicourse.  Examples of such expenses include travel expenses, registration fees, and the costs of duplicating materials.  Expense vouchers will be provided to organizers at the meeting.

If two or more individuals organize a minicourse, they should agree on the distribution of expenses, and their requests for reimbursement should be submitted together.  Presenters who have other means of support for travel expenses and duplication costs are encouraged to use them.

While many minicourse presenters will have presentations whose format relies on information in a commercially-available product, such as a book or authored software, the promotion of such materials in the minicourse is not appropriate.  Attendees at a successful minicourse naturally will seek out relevant publications of the presenters, but the minicourse may not be used to promote a particular product.

The recording or broadcasting of any MAA sponsored event, including but not limited to proceedings at sectional and national meetings, workshops, minicourses, short-courses, and colloquia, is strictly forbidden without the explicit written permission of the Mathematical Association of America.