Hello everyone, it is again time for the Call For Presenters (CFP) for our “Proving Ground” track! Proving Ground was created in order to give speakers who have never presented at a national conference (regional conferences and other BSides events not included) a means to give a talk during one of the biggest weeks for the hacker and information security community. We pair all accepted speakers with a mentor, who will assist them with everything from talking points, slide layout and design, and delivery before giving your talk in Las Vegas. The goal is to help new speakers get comfortable with delivering talks in hopes that they will continue sharing their ideas and unique perspectives with the rest of the community.
The process will work like this: you as our potential speakers will be asked for an abstract for a 20 minute talk that you would like help preparing for presentation using the link below. Once our CFP review team has made their decisions as to which talks have been accepted, a list of all the abstracts will go out to our Mentor List. The mentors will then state which talks they would like to help with, based on the mentor’s area(s) of expertise. After all presentations have been assigned mentors, an introductory email will go out to every pair so that the presenter and mentor can begin working with one another, preparing an outline and presentation. Once this is completed, the presenter will practice their talk with their mentor via Skype, Google Hangouts, etc. in order to work on timing, inflection, message, and body language. On the day of the presentation, the speakers will have their mentor present in order to give them a “friendly face” in the audience as well as assist them with Q&A, should it be needed.
Proving Ground is augmented by a Scholarship program. Should you need or want it, and your talk is accepted, BSidesLV will provide you with a Scholarship of up to $500, to help you offset the costs of coming to Vegas to present. Scholarships will be paid out after you have successfully completed your presentation, when you turn in your program evaluation form. If you’re interested in taking advantage of this program, please indicate so, where requested, on the CFP submission form. Good Luck!
You can find the submission page page here: https://bsideslv.org/cfp
