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School of Music | Desert Skies Symposium
Desert Skies 2025
Registration
Coming Soon!
Call for Papers
The Desert Skies Symposium on Research in Music Learning and Teaching invites submissions for the seventeenth biennial meeting, to be held February 20-22, 2025, on the Tempe campus of Arizona State University.
You are invited to submit papers related to research on music learning and teaching in any context. The Desert Skies Symposium conceives of research broadly and encourages the submission of a variety of methodologies and styles of inquiry.
We encourage applications from college and university faculty, graduate and undergraduate students, preK12 music educators, teaching artists, music therapists and music therapy researchers, and community music educators. Finally, we explicitly encourage work that centers equity and justice as well as interdisciplinary study and community-based or community-inspired work.
Submit your abstract of 700-800 words (reference not included in word count) by 11:59 pm Pacific Standard Time on Sunday, September 15, 2024 as an attachment with this link.
Include the author or first author’s last name in the filename (e.g., Smith.DesertSkies.2023).
Download a copy of the 2025 CFP here.
Keynote Speakers
Coming Soon!
Conference Schedule and Locations
Coming Soon!
Travel
Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport is the main airport serving the Greater Phoenix area. It serves more than 40 million passengers a year, and goes to more than 100 domestic and international destinations, making it one of the 10 busiest airports in the U.S. With about 1,200 daily flights—about 500 nonstop—Sky Harbor is one of the most convenient airports and is about six miles from the campus and the conference hotel.
The conference hotels (Hyatt House and Hyatt Place) have a free shuttle between the hotel and airport. Connect with the front desk for the airport shuttle. Directions from Sky Harbor Airport.
Housing
Rooms are available at a nightly rate on February 19-22 at Hyatt Place and Hyatt House (both are housed in the same building). To reserve a Double Queen, please visit Hyatt Place and to book a king suite visit Hyatt House. The rate for a double queen is $169.00 and the rate for a king suite is $159.00.
Booking Directions
Online. Use your group-specific link to navigate to the hotel website, click “book now”, select your arrival and departure date then click “book now” again (the link puts the group code in for you). The Hyatt Place-King Group Code is G-2080 and Hyatt House-Double Queen Group Code is G-6399.
By Phone. Call 888-591-1234 and ask to reserve a room within the group block using the specific property name and group code.
Group rooms/rates will only be available over the contracted group dates. Each guest is responsible for paying their own room, taxes, incidentals, and damages. If you need additional dates or any further assistance please contact Christopher Villalpando, Manager of Sales, at 480-219-5956 or via email, christopher.villalpando1@hyatt.com.
Getting Around Tempe
Hyatt Place and Hyatt House are located approximately 0.5 miles away from Old Main, the site of the Symposium. You may use the following link to find directions across campus—Travel Between Hyatt Place, Hyatt House, and the Old Main.
If there are conference attendees who need assistance traveling from the hotel to the Symposium space, transportation is available at the start and end of each Symposium day—please use this form if you need a ride: Desert Skies 2025 Travel Assistance. An ASU Music Learning and Teaching representative will be in contact with details.
If you need to park on campus, please use this form (this link has been updated for access to those outside ASU): Parking at Desert Skies 2025
Instructions for Presenters
The Desert Skies Symposium has used the following presentation format for several years, and we will continue with this format for the 2025 event.
Sessions are 90 minutes long. Each 90-minute session will begin with eight to nine one-minute lightening talks given by each of that session’s presenters. The lightening talks are session overviews to help attendees select three presentations to attend. Attendees will then go to one of the presentation tables/spaces, where authors will present seated at a table to six to ten attendees.
Typically, presenters do not read entire papers. We ask that you prepare a presentation of your research in a format that fosters engaging discussion and questions from those who have selected your session. Some presenters choose to use slides and/or audio/video clips using their personal laptop computers. We will have some laptops/ipads available for presenters to use if needed. Some past presenters chose to provide handouts or an outline. Neither is required. Additional ideas are welcome!
After about 25 minutes, groups rotate, and presenters repeat to a new small group, then another rotation occurs. In other words, you will present/discuss your research three times, each time with a different small group of attendees, during the same 90-minute session.