In early 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic affected academic life in various ways. Among other concerns, the pandemic changed the way that research seminars were conducted. I helped to transition two preexisting seminars from in-person to virtual formats and also co-organized a virtual seminar that was created in response to the pandemic. As the restrictions associated with COVID-19 ease and in-person seminars return (at least partially), it is important to assess what we, as a community of scholars, learned from our experience of moving seminars online. More important, we have an imperative to ensure that the lessons that virtual seminars have taught us are not lost.

My viewpoint is informed by three experiences. First, I organized the internal brown-bag seminar at the University of Rochester department of political science in the spring of 2020. Second, Sergio Montero and I organized the Wallis Institute of Political Economy outside-speaker seminar series in 2020. Third, with Alexandra Cirone, Ryan Hubert, Andrew Little, and Anne Meng, I co-organized the Virtual Formal Theory Workshop in 2021. This workshop was created in response to the pandemic as a way to maintain a sense of community among scholars interested in formal political theory.

Organizing virtual seminars at the height of the pandemic was not easy, and these seminars—the Rochester internal brown bag, the Wallis seminar series, and the Virtual Formal Theory Workshop—were far from perfectly executed (on my part). I have learned several lessons that inform how I think about seminar organizing—in particular, from the contrast between traditional in-person seminars to fully virtual seminars. I share these lessons in the spirit of contributing to a discipline-wide discussion about how best to utilize virtual tools going forward, which I believe will be useful for transitioning back to in-person activities.

In my view, organizing a seminar entails two ethical responsibilities that should guide which parts of virtual seminars we retain when in-person seminars resume. First, seminar organizers have an obligation to the audience—whether they are departmental colleagues or members of a research community (e.g., formal theorists, methodologists, and comparativists). Second, organizers should carefully consider which scholars are invited to seminars. Presentations are opportunities for scholars to improve their work and gain visibility. Because there is no substitute for a seminar presentation, organizers are ethically obligated to ensure that seminars—through the scholars they elevate and the opportunities they offer to departments and research communities—constitute a positive force in shaping the discipline.

For seminars that traditionally were held in person but were forced online by COVID-19, it is important that they resume as we transition out of the pandemic. Seminars that traditionally were held in person have a rigid format and admittedly were difficult to adapt to the pandemic. A major misperception early on was the idea that we simply should host a seminar—but on Zoom! I learned quickly that the interactive dialogue in which audience members ask questions and speakers respond generally did not translate well to virtual formats. However, the interactive seminar format is valuable and it is important to return to it once health risks can be managed effectively.

Compared to virtual seminars, in-person seminars are less inclusive in terms of the speakers who are invited, but they can be more inclusive in terms of audience-member access, for two important reasons. First, in-person seminars generally facilitate more engagement—for example, more questions from graduate students and junior scholars—than virtual formats (holding fixed the audience). Second, in-person seminars provide unique opportunities for junior scholars—particularly graduate students—to meet visiting speakers one-on-one or in a small group. These networking opportunities are feasible in virtual environments, but there are barriers. Most notably, in organizing the participant list for a virtual seminar (i.e., who has virtual access), we inevitably overlook scholars who perhaps are most in need of the type of exposure that an outside-speaker series can provide. Therefore, internal seminars should remain internal and—even when virtual—restrict audience access to those within a department.

Virtual seminars cannot replicate the benefit of in-person interaction, but they have unique advantages. Perhaps one of the most important accomplishments of the Virtual Formal Theory Seminar was providing an outlet for junior scholars, particularly graduate students, who have an interest in formal theory to receive mentorship without requiring a formal theorist to be “in residence.” For example, as part of the Virtual Formal Theory Workshop, we offer a separate mentoring program—the Junior Scholars Symposium—which is a workshop-style meeting between a junior scholar and faculty mentors (mostly at the junior level), a type of meeting that was rare before the pandemic. This example highlights an important aspect of a virtual seminar: it enables more people to participate. Consequently, scholars who do not have a robust seminar series at their own institution can watch presentations from a variety of scholars across the world.

These considerations highlight a key tradeoff that seminar organizers must confront in moving forward. The pandemic raised an important question about whether access to a seminar series should be expanded. The onus is on organizers to consider how to use the return to in-person workshops to support and benefit their audience in light of the opportunities lost during the pandemic. Ultimately, access to a seminar should be resolved on a case-by-case basis, depending on who constitutes the “appropriate” audience.

The seminars that were created in response to the pandemic have always been virtual, and it is important that they continue and, critically, receive institutional support. These seminars have a much more fluid format and, in my experience, they ran more smoothly during the pandemic. They can partially alleviate the reduced opportunities for scholars—especially junior scholars. However, it is important to note that these seminars have served not simply as a substitute for existing professional activities (e.g., conferences) but also have (partially) closed some of the gaps in the diversity of speakers typically represented. Because in-person seminars involve travel and lodging expenditures and virtual seminars entail almost no costs, virtual seminars have improved the exposure for some scholars who otherwise are prevented from making in-person presentations.

The virtual seminars that were created in response to the pandemic—like the Virtual Formal Theory Workshop—showcased the work of great scholars who reside in locations where travel is expensive—that is, essentially anywhere outside of North America. The seminars can connect a geographically dispersed audience that otherwise must gather at major conferences, where a presentation is one of many and the depth of engagement is less. Now and in the future, these virtual workshops create options for scholars who may have a difficult home situation (e.g., caring for children or a sick parent) or their own health concerns. The Virtual Formal Theory Workshop has cultivated a sense of community among a diverse set of scholars. It is my hope that this continues and grows when in-person activities resume.

The pandemic created a “shock” to how we interact as scholars. We mostly responded as good scientifically minded scholars should—through experimentation and reflection. Virtual seminars provide a unique opportunity to partially address some of the inequities that stubbornly persist in academia. Although I believe that there are important benefits from more traditionally styled seminars, their format can be overly rigid; the diversity and inclusion problems cannot be solved without addressing those concerns in academia more broadly. However, this does not mean that the seminar ecosystem should not change. It would be shortsighted and irresponsible to disregard the important lessons that the pandemic forced us to learn and for us to not change accordingly.