The Institute on Immigrant Integration Research & Policy is pleased to announce a call for abstracts for its inaugural conference on immigrant integration.

The inaugural conference will be held on May 22, 2024, at the University at Albany.

The Institute on Immigrant Integration Research & Policy is holding its inaugural conference on immigrant integration on May 22, 2024. The one-day conference titled, “Leveraging Opportunities for Immigrant Integration in New York State,” will be held in person at the University at Albany and will offer a virtual participation option. The conference will bring together practitioners, policymakers, policy implementers, and researchers to discuss the most pressing challenges and examine leveraging opportunities for immigrant economic, social, and political integration.

Addressing cultural and linguistic isolation is an overarching lens through which topics will be examined.

There are five conference tracks as follows:

• Practice Matters: Showcasing culturally and linguistically appropriate evidence-based models, promising programs, and innovative interventions which advance integration. Topics may include programs that advance workforce development; labor market integration; poverty alleviation; access to equitable health and mental healthcare; social determinants of health; and social cohesion.
• Inclusive Governance: Innovative approaches and strategies that build system integration capacity and advance inclusive governance. Topics may include mechanisms developed by state and local government to ensure responsive planning and budgeting that take into consideration the needs of culturally and linguistically isolated communities.
•  Integration Evaluation: Effective data platforms that strengthen measurement and monitoring of integration. Topics may include data systems; monitoring tools; and measurement methodologies to assess economic, social, and political integration indicators.
• Promising Technologies: The use of technologies and Artificial Intelligence to enhance integration efforts. Topics may include examining the potential and pitfalls of new technologies that address cultural and linguistic isolation of foreign-born New Yorkers and enable a more efficient and effective governance and service provision.
• Policies: Examination of federal, state, and local policies that hinder or facilitate economic, social, and political integration. Topics may include policies that advance social cohesion; address discrimination and exclusions; promote economic mobility and workforce development; strengthen civic engagement and citizenship; provide affordable housing; and accessible transportation to foreign-born residents.

Proceedings of the conference will be published and will include practice and policy recommendations that emerge from the conference.

Please submit abstracts to Guillermo Martinez, Deputy Director & Intergovernmental Liaison at the Institute on Immigrant Integration Research & Policy on or before Wednesday, January 31, 2024. Abstracts must provide the applicant’s name, organizational affiliation, and contact information.  Abstracts that describe the process and outcomes of research projects must include goals, objectives, methodology, research design, findings, and implications to policy and practice. Practice-oriented abstracts must include goals, program/model description, implementation process, outcomes, and potential for replicability. Abstracts should use 12-point font and should not exceed one single-spaced page. Please specify the conference track the presentation falls under.

Submitting an abstract does not guarantee acceptance or inclusion in the conference program. All abstracts will be reviewed by a committee of the Institute’s Board of Advisors. The committee reserves the right to accept or reject any submissions. Notification of abstract selection will start on Monday, February 12, 2024.

Submit your abstracts here. Please send any questions to conference organizer Guillermo Martinez at [email protected].

The 2024 Conference on Immigrant Integration will provide language interpretation at the request of conference registrants/attendees.