CALL 2019 Conference Wrap-Up

Megan Siu, who chaired to organizing committee for the 2019 annual conference of the Canadian Association of Law Libraries that took place in Edmonton in late May, has provided her take on what goes into such an event on her blog Megscellany.

Get a load of the obstacles the organizers successfully overcame:

• Several construction plans within downtown Edmonton were (and are) scheduled to continue until 2020 or 2021
• CALL/ACBD’s event management company changed around the 1 year mark
• A plenary speaker needed to be replaced in January (4-5 months before the conference)
• Alberta’s provincial election writ was dropped in February (3 months before the conference)
  • This meant that the election communications policy hindered the participation of about half of the conference planning committee
  • We had to remove certain local sponsor logos and government employee bios and session descriptions from the conference website and program until the election period ended
  • We couldn’t advertise anything to do with provincial government programs or employees on CALL-L, In Session, the CALL/ACBD website, or social media
• The Westin Edmonton (our conference venue booked 2 years in advance) flooded in March (2 months before the conference)
• 1 of our social tours double-booked themselves
• A number of flights coming in from BC were delayed within the first 2 days of the conference
• 2 of our lightning talk speakers experienced medical setbacks during the conference
• We were in the middle of Alberta’s fire season and there were 7 states of local emergency declared right before the conference started

 That is an amazing story.

 It was a great conference.

Thank you Megan.