Summary and Goal of the Program: 

Emerging scholars (assistant professors and doctoral students) have the opportunity to participate in a limited number of research roundtables during the 54th Annual Conference in-person in Indianapolis, IN (November 20-22, 2025). The Emerging Scholars Research Roundtables are designed to provide participants with in-depth feedback on their research papers to help prepare for publication.

Selected participants should expect to actively participate in the roundtables. Each participant will submit written work for review and serve as a reviewer and discussant of other participants’ work. Shared research papers should be a FULL rough draft (approximately 4,000 to 8,000 words). Each participant will be assigned to take the lead on a peer’s research paper. Participants will extensively review the assigned papers and be prepared to offer and discuss their constructive and in-depth feedback for all papers during the roundtables. (Written comments are strongly encouraged and can be shared during/after the roundtables). This peer-review process is designed to ensure fairness and active engagement and promises to build mentoring, networking and collaboration opportunities. Established scholars in the field will coordinate the roundtables and provide their own feedback.   

Award and Benefits:  

• Feedback from and connection with senior scholars 
• $100 off conference registration  
• Lunch provided on Thursday of the conference 
• Recognized in the conference program 

Eligibility: 

• Participants are PhD students, post-docs, and assistant professors, within the first 3 years of their employment.
• Participants may come from any country, institution and academic discipline. 
• The research must be focused on a topic related to philanthropy, voluntary action, civil society and/or the nonprofit/NGO sector. 
• The scope of the research may be comparative, international, or domestic; and theoretical, analytical or empirical. 
• Submissions should be in preparation for stand alone journal articles. Dissertation proposals or book chapters are not eligible. 
• Co-authored work is acceptable, but the participant should be the lead author. 

Application Requirements and Submission: 

• Extended abstract (approximately 1,000 words) due July 1, 2025 
• Selected participants will need to submit a full draft of their paper by September 1, 2025.  
• Participants will have the opportunity to send an updated manuscript draft approximately one month before the conference. 
• Participants may use the same manuscript for this opportunity and submission through the regular conference proposal system.