The Association of University Presses was pleased to award a number of grants to support attendance at its 2024 Annual Meeting in Montréal, Quebec. The Next Steps Grant, covering registration fees, were awarded to two attendees who each have more than three years total experience in scholarly publishing and have not attended an in-person Annual Meeting in the past.

Grant recipients Caroline McKusick and Sarah Rous offered the following brief descriptions of their experiences. 

Caroline McKusick, Associate Editor, Stanford University Press

I attended the 2024 AUPresses Annual Meeting in Montréal hoping to connect with my colleagues who are seeking to make academic publishing socially transformative. I attended several panels, but particularly galvanizing was a panel titled “Practicing What You Publish: Presses, Authors, and Controversial Topics,” which dealt with the recent wave of right-wing censorship, repression, and misinformation targeting knowledge production in many U.S. states. Speakers related how they, as editors, have intervened to support their books and authors—not just in moments of crisis, but through everyday practices that build networks of trust and support. I appreciated learning about the ways my colleagues are fighting back to defend basic rights for their authors, including ways that aren’t always visible and making headlines.

I benefited from the insights in so many panels, but even more than that, I valued the Annual Meeting for the unique opportunity of offering one-on-one conversation with other publishing workers. It meant a lot to me to learn about the parallel efforts we’re all making at our own presses and in our own departments. For instance, it has been a goal of mine to make publishing more transparent to authors. From the time when I was completing a PhD, I saw how knowledge of the publishing process tended to be inaccessible and less than transparent in ways that reinforce historic marginalizations and inequalities. So I was pleased that this meeting gave me the chance to connect with the Faculty Outreach Committee, the people behind the Ask UP resources and other efforts to equip authors with knowledge of scholarly publishers’ goals and concerns. I volunteered for and have now joined the committee and look forward to finding ways to join in the work that’s already happening to share knowledge of the ins and outs of academic publishing.

Sarah Rous, Senior Project Editor, American School of Classical Studies at Athens Publications

I was thrilled to attend my first in-person AUPresses Annual Meeting this year, about four and a half years into my career in academic publishing and just weeks after stepping into an expanded role as Senior Project Editor at my small press. Coming from the world of academia with its relatively formal and high-stakes conferences, I found the AUPresses meeting to be an energizing breath of fresh air. The timing was great for me: I had enough experience to take away some concrete ideas from panels and discussions relevant to my own responsibilities (e.g., the sessions “Evolving Approaches to Alt-text” and “Good (Is) Enough: Strategies for Making Books in the Real World”), but I was still new enough to the world of publishing that I was eager for the opportunity to absorb more knowledge of the larger ecosystem from panels on topics like press finances and intellectual property concerns in the age of AI.

Generative AI was undoubtedly the hot topic of the conference. It was enlightening to hear about the ways presses with more departments and resources are experimenting with, skeptical of, benefitting from, and/or concerned about AI. I was inspired to start experimenting with it myself for a few of my tasks (but not the writing of this report, although the thought crossed my mind!).

Overall, I found the spirit of collaboration and sharing of experiences within the university press world refreshing—and this ethos was apparent in panels, workshops, and conversations during meals and coffee breaks. The idea of “networking” has always made me feel queasy, but it turns out to be fun when it just means striking up a conversation with whomever you happen to sit down next to during breakfast or lunch! Perhaps my favorite events of the Annual Meeting, the 5k run and the EDP trivia session, were also excellent examples of what I now see as the spirit of AUPresses: Connecting and learning while having a great time doing it!