Changing Scientific Meetings for the Better

comment Changing scientifc meetings for the better Conferences are a pivotal part of the scientifc enterprise, but large in-person meetings have several disadvantages. As the pandemic experience has shown, online meetings are a viable alternative. Accelerating eforts to improve conferences in virtual formats can lead to a more equitable and sustainable conference culture. Sarvenaz Sarabipour, Aziz Khan, Yu Fen Samantha Seah, Aneth D. Mwakilili, Fiona N. Mumoki, Pablo J. Sáez, Benjamin Schwessinger, Humberto J. Debat and Tomislav Mestrovic cientific conferences are important of over 20% since 2007. With the current affect the lives and careers of scientists avenues for researchers to share and career norms, researchers are expected to working in developing countries, but also Sdiscuss research findings, to exchange fly nationally and internationally, often citizens of countries with visa restrictions ideas and insights, and to network for several times a year, for scientific meetings. who live and perform research in global collaboration and career development. Conference attendance accounts for 35% of scientific research centres and wish to attend Organizing inclusive and useful scientific a researcher’s footprint2. In hosting hundreds conferences elsewhere meetings is a significant responsibility to thousands of researchers, conferences shared by researchers, scientific societies, produce substantial air-travel-related Inequity in access and means. The and other organizations worldwide. Prior CO2 emissions, comparable to the global organization of many conferences leads to to 2020, most conferences were held annual per capita CO2 emissions in many practices that exclude researchers on a wide in-person and provided limited attendance countries, as well as large amounts of other range of factors including, but not limited opportunities for many researchers from waste in the form of promotional items. The to, gender, ethnic, racial, socioeconomic, diverse socioeconomic backgrounds, overwhelming majority of conferences are not health, and geographical backgrounds, as particularly early career researchers (ECRs), environmentally sustainable and lack clear well as career stages. For instance, women researchers from low- and middle-income green strategies or climate policies. Clearly, and other under-represented researchers are countries, and junior principal investigators the scientific community that is supposed the least likely to be offered opportunities (PIs)1. Some conferences in select disciplines to understand the problem better should to speak at or chair meetings in their have implemented valuable changes for the contribute to reducing their travel-related discipline5,6. The current lack of diversity 3,4 community, becoming more receptive to CO2 emissions . hinders advancement in scholarship, and it is attendees with families. Due to the COVID-19 especially discouraging to junior researchers. pandemic, a major shift has occurred towards Attendance fees. The costs associated with There has also been inertia in setting up and virtual conferencing formats, triggering attending conferences include meeting implementing more family-friendly policies discussions in the scientific community registration fees, airfares, accommodations, at scientific meetings7. A small fraction of on the current and future formats and ground transportation, food, and event conferences includes some form of career organization of conferences. Here we provide tickets. The registration fees alone often development workshop and/or promotion recommendations for improving scientific range from a few hundred to over a events such as special symposiums, podium meetings towards more efficient, sustainable, thousand US dollars. The total cost of talks, and poster or oral presentation awards and equitable gatherings. attending large national and international for ECRs. scientific meetings is in the thousands of The many disadvantages of in-person dollars, equivalent to one or more months How to improve academic conferences conferences of graduate and postdoctoral researcher net Organize national and international We examined 270 national and international salary worldwide. As a result, a principal meetings in fully or mostly virtual academic conferences held in person investigator may attend multiple conferences formats. Researchers, scientific societies, during 2018–2019 in various disciplines a year, but will have to budget thousands and funders should work together to for their features, costs, and impact on the of dollars to send multiple trainees to one improve the format and organization community. We found that many meetings conference per year. of conferences (Fig. 2 and Table 1). could be improved significantly in terms Conferences in remote vacation destinations of diversity, inclusivity, ECR promotion, Visa requirements. Obtaining short-term are difficult to justify, as these accumulate networking and career development, venue visas to travel to scientific meetings is a large carbon footprint, often without accessibility, and, importantly, reducing a major hurdle for many researchers, clear scientific objectives and little to no the meetings’ carbon footprint (Fig. 1 and particularly those from developing nations1. benefit to the local scientific community. Supplementary Information). A number of countries have explicitly stated On the other hand, most ground-based that certain nationalities are not welcome or transportation modes produce lower CO2 Carbon dioxide emissions. The increasing will have to endure lengthy, uncertain, and emissions. Regional society meetings number and size of scientific conferences held costly procedures to obtain a visa. Ongoing provide many benefits, such as low hosting in-person contribute to rising atmospheric or long-term conflicts as well as recent costs, and they can be livestreamed, carbon dioxide (CO2) levels and thus to changes in the political climate at conference recorded, and made available online for climate change. There are over 8.4 million destinations (often major scientific hubs), the benefit of other researchers globally. full-time and full-time-equivalent researchers such as travel bans, have added to these Regional conferences held in more globally as of 2015, representing a growth challenges. These obstacles not only deeply economic and public venues, such as 296 NATURE HUMAN BEHAVIOUR | VOL 5 | MARCH 2021 | 296–300 | www.nature.com/nathumbehav comment Academic conferences Over 180 years $1–4k Meeting frequency attendance Neuroscience Ecology costs 74% annual Physics Industry Engineering 20% biennial worth Evolution Up to $2k Chemistry tens of Genetics registration Plant biology costs 1% triennial Each up to billions Cell biology (US $) Cancer research 30,000+ Paleontology 4% quadrennial 6% with attendees worldwide green strategies 1% other Multiple millions of tonnes make up 35% of of CO2 researchers’ carbon footprint Total 850,000+ attendees 38% promote ECRs 20% offer networking 92% no gender 4% livestream 1% live eposters or with research awards events equity statement sessions twitter posters 12% offer 19% offer 15% offer 6% offer public 11% offer eposters 91% offer e-program caregiver grants childcare services nursing rooms outreach activities or video, audio digital book or app yet print libraries of recorded talks on paper Promoting diversity Conference chairs 46% Grant writing Publishing Session chairs 36% Data management Implicit bias Keynote speakers 40% Peer-review training Ethics Work–life balance Reproducibility Plenary speakers 38% Effective teaching Mentoring Featured speakers 19% Science communication Public policy Early-career faculty training Organizing committee 37% Navigating job market Writing 78% no diversity only 35% offer a Scientific committee 27% statement career development Succeeding in collaborations workshop $ Publishing industries Code of ethics 22% Scientific societies Meeting sponsors Funding agencies and organizers Code of conduct 41% Corporations Universities Fig. 1 | In-person academic conferences are costly and exclusive. Summary analysis of features of 270 conferences held in-person by over 150 scientific societies and organizations during 2018–2019 in various scientific disciplines (Supplementary Information). Aggregate analysis is presented from a database of in-person conferences (https://elifeambassadors.github.io/improving-conferences/). Overall, the majority of meetings were held frequently (annually), and their formats and organization lacked environmental sustainability, inclusive practices, and promotion and training opportunities for early-career researchers. schools or university campuses, may also Virtual global conferences and local hubs. audience with limited geographic impact, offer attendees the opportunity to visit local Face-to-face interactions at conferences often restricted to wealthy economies. laboratories, tour facilities, and interact that are important in generating new ideas, Switching to fully virtual conference modes with the local scientists, potentially bringing networks, and collaborations can also be will increase reach and access to knowledge benefit to the local community. These facilitated via digital conferencing. Reducing worldwide. Multi-location in-person meetings enable interactions and discussions academic air travel does not impact conferences, where participants only travel of science in ways that provide ECRs with professional success8. Speakers spend time to a nearby location to interact with other ample opportunities

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