2009 Guidelines for Submitting Papers to the ACA VISTAS Online Library

Remember – all submissions will undergo a peer-review process and will be considered for inclusion in both the online library and the ACA VISTAS 2009 print publication, Compelling Counseling Interventions.

If you have been selected to present a session at the 2009 ACA Conference and Exposition, 2008 NCDA Global Conference, or the 2007 ACES Conference, you are eligible to submit a paper for inclusion in VISTAS Online. Your paper must be driven by your program and must be a new paper, not just a re-submission of your proposal. VISTAS Online can accept papers that use or build on ideas presented in papers previously published if the new paper is itself original and not printed elsewhere. If you are in doubt on this point and wish further guidance, please email your questions to VISTASOnline@comcast.net.

Preparation of Your Paper:

• Prepare a paper of no more than 3,000 words targeting the major concepts of your program. Pay particular attention to expressing the importance of your topic and how what you present can be adopted or adapted by other counseling professionals.
• Under the title of your paper, include a line that states:
  • “Paper based on a program presented at the 2009 American Counseling Association Annual Conference and Exposition, March 19-23, Charlotte, North Carolina.”
  • “Paper based on a program presented at the 2008 National Career Development Association Global Conference, July 9-11, 2008, Washington, DC.”
  • “Paper based on a program presented at the 2007 Association for Counselor Education and Supervision Conference, October 11-14, Columbus, Ohio. ”
• Use a straightforward, informative approach that is interesting, but grammatically correct.
• Follow APA guidelines for references.
• Diagrams, charts, etc., may be used only if they are an integral part of the file and do not require special software to be opened.
• PowerPoint presentations that can stand alone without additional commentary are acceptable.*
• Handouts that you will be offering to participants may be included as appendices to your paper.
• At the end of the paper, include a brief bio for each author using the following format:
  [Last name], [First name and Initial], is a [title/position] at [Institution/Organization]. [Maximum of two sentences describing experience, expertise, and/or research interests].

Important: To be selected for inclusion in VISTAS Online, your article must contain accurate, substantive, and useful information in addition to meeting the above technical criteria. If your article is accepted, no further editing and only minor formatting will be done before it is posted to VISTAS Online. Therefore, it is crucial that you use your best writing skills and do a final proofing of your article before you submit it.

Submission of Your Paper:

Email your paper as an MS Word attachment to VISTASOnline@comcast.net. Your article must be emailed to us by October 27, 2008. An email notifying you that your paper has been received will be sent within one week of receipt of your paper. Notification of the final disposition of your work will be e-mailed on December 5, 2009.

Papers selected for inclusion in VISTAS Online will be copyrighted by ACA. A release form, granting copyright permission to ACA, will be forwarded to authors upon acceptance of their papers. The form must be signed and returned before the article can be included in VISTAS Online. This copyright will not preclude authors from submitting an altered or expanded version of their papers (with a different title) to other potential publishers.

Garry R. Walz, Jeanne C. Bleuer, and Richard K. Yep, Editors

Please direct all VISTAS questions to VISTASOnline@comcast.net. Directing questions to ACA staff will result in a delayed response.

* PowerPoint presentations will not be considered for the print publication.

Back to Information for VISTAS Authors