Making the SIGUCCS experience last year-long; how a regional conference became a local chapter

ABSTRACT

In 1997, as a result of conversations that started during a SIGUCCS conference, several NY state schools formed a regional conference called NYCHES (New York Computing in Higher Education Symposium). SIGUCCS attendees from these schools wanted to continue the 'SIGUCCS dialogs' throughout the year, so NYCHES has met a few times a year since 1997, with participation increasing to include dozens of schools across central and western NY state. Schools would volunteer to host the day-long meeting, and provide food for the attendees. There was no membership fee to be involved in NYCHES, so costs to attendees were minimized to travel expenses. Cost containment, particularly in the face of constricting travel budgets for many schools, made a regional conference an attractive option for schools that could not afford to send many people to national conferences. Even so, based on their experiences in NYCHES many members became active SIGUCCS attendees, and conversations started during SIGUCCS would continue on in NYCHES meetings through the year. On March 19 2012, NYCHES became the first local chapter for SIGUCCS. SIG Chapters, and their membership, receive considerable benefits from the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM) including website hosting, membership tools, mailing list hosting, recruitment tools, ACM email addresses, subscriptions to ACM publications, and access to the ACM Distinguished Speakers Program. Chapter members are not required to pay for membership, unless they wish to serve on the Board of the Chapter, so despite the substantial benefits, costs to their respective institutions are still minimized. This paper will discuss how NYCHES was successful as a regional conference, and how this format could be duplicated in other parts of the country. It will also discuss how the members of a regional conference would benefit from a formal association with both ACM and SIGUCCS.

References

1. http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=337125&dl=ACM&coll=DL&CFID=102793126&CFTOKEN=11014398
2. http://dl.acm.org/dl.cfm
3. http://campus.acm.org/public/chapters_conf_cal/index.cfm
4. http://campus.acm.org/public/profqj/promotional_materials.cfm
5. http://www.dsp.acm.org/

Index Terms

• Applied computing

  • Education

• Social and professional topics

  • Professional topics

    • Management of computing and information systems

      • Project and people management