The Call for Speakers for next year’s annual BCS Software Practice Advancement conference is now available.

The conference takes place from 5-8 April 2009 at the Robinson Centre, Bedfordshire, England.

Here’s the blurb:

The SPA Conference, now in its 17th year, is the place where leading software development practitioners gather to share their latest thinking.themes are only given as an indication of possible sessions.

You’ll find its interactive sessions, high proportion of attendees who are also presenters, and residential nature make SPA a unique and memorable conference. Many attendees return year after year. You’ll meet expert participants who as as keen to learn and discover as they are to share what they know.

We welcome submissions from everyone – you don’t have to be an expert or an experienced presenter. You’ll be supported by well-established shepherding process which provides assistance and support to all presenters.

Presenters pay a reduced rate for the conference, and this year you might be able to attend for free! We will be awarding a free place to the best proposal from a new presenter. You qualify if you’ve never presented at SPA, even if you’re submitting with a co-presenter who has.

Presenting at SPA is great for your profile within the software development community. We’re looking for session proposals which are interactive and leading edge, possibly even experimental. They can be about technology or teams, practice or process – in fact anything to do with improving software development. They can be as main stream or niche as you like – we select proposals on their merit not on their trendiness. The suggested

The submission deadline is  6pm on Monday 15th September 2008.

I’ve spoken at SPA for the past four years and really enjoy the experience. Unlike many other conferences the program committee and assorted speaking veterans [1] spend lots of time on reviewing each session proposal and providing feedback to session proposers. If you are accepted then you’ll be allocated a shepherd, usually an experienced SPA speaker, to guide you through the process of preparing your session. This provides very valuable support even if you’ve spoken many times before as it helps you tune your session for the typical SPA audience.

I’m planning to volunteer at the conference again so if you do make it to the event come and say hello.

[1] I’ve been part of the group to review session proposals for the past couple of years but wouldn’t yet consider myself a veteran – there are a few people who attend who have been to every single SPA (formerly OT) conference…