Annual Meeting 2018: Thematic Sessions, Interactive Oral Sessions & Workshops

This year our Annual Meeting will be taking place at Birmingham International Conference Centre from 16 – 19 December. Last year we saw over 1500 delegates attending from nearly 50 countries around the world.

We have are now accepting proposals for Thematic Sessions, Interactive Oral Sessions, and Workshops, which provides a valuable opportunity for the community to share research, initiate timely discussions, and generate ideas to a large international audience.

Thematic Sessions

Thematic Sessions aim to create a high profile forum for the discussion of timely, innovative and/or important questions, provide local ‘flavour’ within the programme, and showcase integration with disciplines outside of ecology (including other natural sciences, social sciences, arts and humanities).

We support submissions from across all ecological fields. However, this year, we are particularly interested in considering proposals with a focus on:

• Advances in microbial ecology for assessing climate change feedbacks and mitigation
• Linking evolutionary ecology with ecosystem function
• Beyond species: intra-specific variation in communities and populations
• Advances in socio-ecological modelling
• Understanding how extreme events are reshaping our understanding of ecology and/or conservation
• The application of ecological metrics to palaeo data

The deadline for submissions is 17:00 (GMT), Thursday 22 March.

Interactive Oral Sessions

The Interactive Oral Sessions are an exciting and high-profile new initiative, through which session participants and meeting delegates can engage with each other on important topics in an innovative manner, such as, but not limited to:

• Speed presentations on a specific topic, followed by a facilitated discussion
• Panel debates
• World café sessions
• Campfire sessions
• 7-14-28 presentations (7 minutes, 14 slides, 28 point font)

The deadline for submissions is 17:00 (GMT), Thursday 22 March.

Workshops

Workshops are a staple of our meeting programme and always highly attended. Workshops are interactive sessions that encourage networking, skills development, and creative thinking. Proposals consisting of a series of talks or presentations without audience participation will not be considered. There will be two types of workshops at Birmingham:

1. 1-hour workshops over the lunch break on the first and second day of the meeting
2. Longer pre-meeting workshops (up to 4 hours) on the Sunday afternoon

Workshops must involve audience participation and usually address at least one of the following workshop categories:

• Education, training, and methods
• Communication, engagement, and outreach
• Policy, conservation, and practical applications
• Crossing disciplinary boundaries (incl. social sciences, arts)

The deadline for submissions is 17:00 (BST), Friday 27 April.

If you have any questions regarding your proposal, please get in touch with Events Manager, Amy Everard.

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