Conferences New and Old: Coronavirus Edition

A number of people have asked me whether the various conferences and workshops I am organizing this summer are still running. I thought I would have a blogpost containing all the current information, which I can update when and if necessary.

Question: Will the Arbeitsgemeinschaft and HIM trimester proceed as planned?

Answer: The answer is that there are no current plans to cancel or postpone either of these events. The MFO has issued a statement here. That said, the situation may change. There was an upcoming conference in Darmstadt which was cancelled today (March 6) with participants receiving the following message (see here):

Although we were hoping and expecting so far that the conference would
take place as planned, and although we still consider the risk of an
infection extremely low, the recommendations from the university TU
Darmstadt and from the German Research Foundation DFG have changed by now, and advise to cancel/postpone conferences and similar events at
this moment.

Note that same site lists a message from March 2 which says We definitively expect that the conference will take place as planned. Given that such plans can change rapidly, and yet buying a plane ticket is something that gets done significantly in advance, this leads naturally to the following question:

Question: Suppose the conference is cancelled. What does that mean for my non-refundable airfare/transport?

Answer: This is a good question, and one I have been trying my best to answer since I have some 25K in participant funds on my NSF grant I have committed to travel for US participants. The answer is pretty much that nobody knows, which is maybe not entirely surprising in the circumstances. I spoke with both my own finance office (who administer my grant) and my program officer at the NSF. The answer from the University of Chicago at this point is there are no definitive answers yet, beyond noting that anyone in this position should start by trying to work directly with the airline. The answer from NSF is also still a work in progress, although this question is directly addressed initem #11 on this list which I reproduce here:

A conference has been canceled, but I have nonrefundable travel and/or hotel costs. Can these be charged to a NSF Conference or Travel grant?

NSF is currently working internally as well as with our federal partners on a number of proposal and award-related issues pertaining to COVID-19. NSF will communicate with the community about these issues and will provide guidance as further information becomes available. In the meantime, please continue to follow all relevant policies and procedures, including those of your organization, and apply those practices consistently.

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I apologize that this email doesn’t really contain any definitive information, although it has definitive confirmation from the NSF that definitive answers are not yet available. I will certainly try to update this blogpost whenever I get further information, but please also feel free to post your own updates and questions.

Update, March 8: At least one US university have asked their faculty to avoid “non-essential travel to Germany”.

Update, March 10: Several more universities have banned “non-essential travel”. Chances of cancellation/postponement are now seriously high, hope to have more information in the next day or so.

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4 Responses to Conferences New and Old: Coronavirus Edition

  1. Felipe Voloch says:

    The Arizona Winter School is happening right now. I would be curious to hear how it is going.

    • Persiflage says:

      I heard they emailed participants offering them the opportunity to cancel (I guess there is a registration and hotel fee). I know that some students at uchicago took them up on their offer and some did not.

  2. JSE says:

    Received yesterday: “For the next 30 days, UW-Madison is canceling and suspending all upcoming university-sponsored travel to countries severely impacted by the virus. This currently includes China, France, Germany, Italy, Iran, Japan, South Korea, and Spain.”

    I’m just back from Arizona Winter School. Some people cancelled, most did not. I think the larger the meeting, the the stronger the rationale for cancelling it (but of course also the more severe the cost of cancelling it.)

  3. Pingback: The Arbeitsgemeinschaft has been indefinitely postponed | Persiflage

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