Date: March 10 – 13, 2026

Location: Hyatt Regency Crystal City, Arlington, Virginia

Tutorials & Workshops: Submit by October 30

https://events.internet2.edu/website/89730/home

The 2026 NAIRR Pilot Annual Meeting invites community submissions for hands-on Tutorials and for community-engaging Workshops that advance the use of NAIRR Pilot and other AI-relevant technology resources. Tutorials and Workshops formats may be half-day (3 hours) or full-day (6 hours) in length, and will be delivered on March 10th (Day 1) at the Annual Meeting. A submission form with a published abstract and 2-page proposal document must be submitted by Thursday, October 30, 2025. Additional details are included below to inform submission content.

Getting Started with Your Proposal Submission

First, you must select “Login” from the menu bar above to access the proposal system and select “New User”. Once you have completed a user profile and have logged in, you will be able to access the “Submissions” fucnction on the top menu bar. On the “Your Submissions” page, click the “add new” to create a proposal.

Who Can Submit a Tutorial or Workshop Proposal?

Anyone involved in a NAIRR Pilot-associated activity may submit. Submissions are especially encouraged from researchers and educators with NAIRR Pilot resource allocations or with funding associated with the NAIRR Pilot (across 14 contributing federal agencies), as well as representatives of NAIRR Pilot resource providers and other partners (including 28 private-sector partners), and individuals who support NAIRR Pilot Operations. The invitation-only nature and limited capacity of the NAIRR Pilot Annual Meeting mean that submissions will be prioritized from Tutorial and Workshop teams that include at least one person from these stakeholder groups who has already received a Save-the-Date. Submissions need to describe any travel support available to bring contributors not covered by the travel support offered via the conference (for each NAIRR Pilot resource allocation PI, plus one trainee, as described in the event FAQ). Limited additional invitations and travel support may be available for Tutorial or Workshop team members who would not otherwise receive these.

Expected Submission Content

Submissions should include (1) a brief abstract (up to 500 words), to attract attendees via conference registration and to be published in the Annual Meeting program, and (2) a 2-page PDF session proposal with a detailed description of how the Tutorial or Workshop will be operated, including: session objectives; relevance to the NAIRR Pilot program and Annual Meeting attendees; how the session’s duration, format, schedule, and team members roles serve these; target audience and expected background and/or skill levels; anticipated attendance (rooms of up to 40 or 80 participants); and a description of prior relevant experience and similar offerings by names members of the session team, and their roles, relevant to the proposed approach. The online submission form also includes the identification of tentative proposed instructors/speakers and helpers. Limited invitations and/or travel support may be available for individuals not already invited to the invitation-only NAIRR Pilot Annual Meeting (see above).

Overarching Review Criteria

Submissions will be reviewed per the following criteria, in addition to requirements specific to Tutorials or Workshops, as described further below:

Relevance to the NAIRR Pilot program priorities.

Potential for advancing AI-relevant research and/or education, in both the content and in the teaching or community engagement approaches described.

Broad relevance for explicitly stated NAIRR Pilot stakeholder groups attending the Meeting, with options including: researchers, educators and/or trainees relevant to NAIRR Pilot resource allocations or NAIRR Pilot-associated funded projects (e.g. Demonstration, EAGER, Outreach/Expansion projects), resource provider representatives, other partners including non-governmental, research computing and data professionals, federal agency representatives, and other NAIRR Pilot program operators.

Experience and readiness of the Tutorial or Workshop team relevant to the content and to the described teaching or engagement approaches, and a clear plan for the use of physical and/or technology resources.

Clarity of the abstract toward informing audience participation, including explicitly stated prerequisites and/or personal technology requirements (e.g. laptops) for participation.

Tutorials

Submissions for tutorials should describe hands-on computational training to be delivered March 10, on-site at the NAIRR Pilot Annual Meeting. Tutorials should teach the use of NAIRR Pilot resources and/or other technology resources for the development, application, and/or teaching of AI methods.

Scope / Relevance Requirements:

Tutorials may cover the use of one or more technology resources for one or more AI-relevant computational tasks, research applications, ect. For example, a tutorial may teach the use of technology tool or other resource that applies across a variety of computational tasks, may teach the application of a particular research method or tool on a particular resource, etc.

Submissions should clearly state which resources, tools, concepts, applications, and skills will be covered, as well as any prerequisite knowledge or experience expected from learners.

Technology Resource Requirements:

The submission form provides an opportunity for submitters to indicate any needs for in-room technology, beyond the default: all rooms will include one to two projectors and screens, a podium mic, a handheld mic for audience participation, and conference WiFi. While the venue’s WiFi network is expected to be available in session rooms during tutorials and workshops, teams should be prepared to conduct their sessions without internet connectivity or with intermittent connectivity, in case of any outages or limitations.

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Submissions should also describe all other resources learners will need to bring or access, and how, including any combination of personal devices, software, computing capacity, models, tokens, data storage, etc.

Learner-provided technology resources (e.g. laptop with WiFi capability, Google account, etc.) are an explicit review criterion, and will also need to be listed in the published session abstract to inform potential registrants.

Per-learner resources for which access will be granted during the tutorial need to be described explicitly, as well as the instructor team’s prior experience with deploying and/or teaching the use of these resources. The proposal document must describe how such resources will be coordinated by the instruction team, including a description of communication between the instruction team and the resource provider, affirming that access to the described resources can be supported in a timely manner at the proposed maximum scale of learners, and with only WiFi access to learner devices. Per-learner quantities of individual resources should be described in a level of detail similar to that expected for NAIRR Pilot Research or Classroom/Educator allocations, as a demonstration of tutorial feasibility. Uses of resource that cannot be confirmed by the relevant resource provider may be rejected.

Workshops

Submissions for on-site workshops will be reviewed with a preference for approaches that enable deep and interactive stakeholder dialogue that explores current practices – and/or informs future needs for – technology resources for AI research and education activities. Submissions should clearly describe a format or combination of formats (e.g. roundtable, breakout discussions, panels, ect.) that maximize input from the scope of explicitly-stated audience stakeholder targets and their value proposition for contributing. Workshop organizers may be asked to briefly report on outcomes from their workshop on a later day during the conference. We do not expect that workshops will invite papers, and the Annual Meeting is not able to support the publication of papers associated with an accepted workshop.

Scope / Relevance Requirements:

Workshops may explore topics within or across the scope of current or future requirements, approaches, and/or practices for using technology resources for AI research, education, or other workforce development activities. Topics need not be specific to existing NAIRR Pilot programs and resources, so long as they are directly relevant to the use of – and needs for – technology resources for AI research and workforce development. Examples might include:

Solutions and/or technologies needed to address specific AI applications and/or societal challenges, such as data privacy and/or ethics requirements, AI control coordination across geographies and sectors, etc.

Community-informed guidance on the future of AI-enabling technology resources and/or services, perhaps addressing needs for open-source tools and models, data quality and access, quantum AI, future hardware and/or service models, etc.

Strategies for engaging with technology partners to support publicly-funded AI development, research applications, and/or workforce development.

Other topics for which a compelling connection can be made to the NAIRR Pilot and/or otherwise to federally-coordinated technologies for AI-relevant research or workforce development.

Technology Resource Requirements:

The submission form provides an opportunity for submitters to indicate any needs for in-room technology, beyond the default: all rooms will include one to two projectors and screens, a podium mic, a handheld mic for audience participation, and conference WiFi. While the venue’s WiFi network is expected to be available in session rooms during tutorials and workshops, teams should be prepared to conduct their session without internet connectivity or with intermittent connectivity, in case of any outages or limitations.

If you have questions or need additional support, please contact meetingregistration@internet2.edu

Thank you for submitting your proposal for the NAIRR Pilot 2026 Annual Meeting!