Second Call for Bids - ACL 2019

Event Notification Type: 
Call for Proposals
Abbreviated Title: 
Location: 
State: 
Country: 
Contact Email: 
City: 
Contact: 
Marti Hearst
Submission Deadline: 
Tuesday, 31 January 2017

Second Call for Bids - ACL 2019
57th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics

The Association for Computational Linguistics (ACL) hereby invites proposals to host the conference in the Europe/Middle East/Africa region in July or August 2019. At this time, we seek preliminary draft proposals from prospective bidders in the relevant regions. Promising bidders will be asked to provide additional information for the final selection.

The ACL 2019 Coordinating Committee, made up of representatives of the ACL and representatives from the EACL (European Association of Computational Linguistics), will select the General Chair and the Program Committee Co-Chairs for the conference. Draft proposals should identify a Local Arrangements Chair, who will work with the General Chair and the Coordinating Committee to develop a detailed plan and budget.

To facilitate conference organization, bidders may delegate many tasks of their choice to a Professional Conference Organizer and/or to the ACL Office (Priscilla Rasmussen). Bid guidelines, including expense and task list templates and additional useful links are provided at:
http://aclweb.org/adminwiki/index.php?title=Bid_Guidelines. The template for local expenses is available here: http://ftp.cs.toronto.edu/pub/gh/ACL-conference-bid-template-Rev-2014-06....

Bid Highlights: Draft proposals include information on the following:

Location (accessibility; conference venue, e.g., hotel or university; accommodation; dining options)
Proposed dates. Religious and local national holidays should be avoided, as much as possible.
Local arrangements team (chair/co-chair, committee, volunteer labor, registration handling; describing any experience the team has had in organizing previous conferences and the number of participants at those conferences)
Local Computational Linguistics community
Meeting venues (space for sessions, tutorials, workshops, posters, exhibits, demos, small meetings and registration)
High-speed, all-ports-open, easy-to-use internet access
Audiovisual equipment
Catering, including breaks, receptions, poster sessions
Local sponsorships
Local expenses estimates spreadsheet (using template provided, link above)
Evaluation: Proposals will be evaluated according to the following criteria (unordered):
Experience, flexibility, and openmindedness of local arrangements team
Local computational linguistics community support
Local government and industry support
Accessibility and attractiveness of proposed site
Suitability of proposed dates
Adequacy of conference and exhibit facilities for the anticipated number of registrants
Adequacy of residence accommodations and food services in a range of price categories and close to the conference facilities
Adequacy of expense projections

Geographical balance with regard to ACL and EACL region in the decade prior to 2019:
EACL: 2017 Valencia, Spain; 2014 Gothenburg, Sweden; 2012 Avignon, France; 2009 Athens, Greece
COLING: 2014 Dublin, Ireland
ACL: 2016 Berlin, Germany; 2013 Sofia, Bulgaria; 2010 Uppsala, Sweden
EMNLP: 2017 Copenhagen, Denmark; 2015 Lisbon, Portugal; 2014 Doha, Qatar; 2011 Edinburgh, UK

Important dates:
November, 2016: Final call for bids
January 31, 2017: Notify intention to submit proposal
March 15, 2017: Draft proposals due
Through May 1, 2017: Feedback to bidders
May 30, 2017: Final bids due
July 1, 2017: Bid selected

The selected location for ACL 2019 will be announced at the ACL 2017 conference (Vancouver, August, 2017).

For any queries please contact Marti Hearst, hearst [at] berkeley.edu, the Coordinating Committee chair, or Priscilla Rasmussen, acl [at] aclweb.org

Please send notifications and draft proposals to:
Marti Hearst
hearst [at] berkeley.edu
University of California Berkeley
102 South Hall Berkeley, CA 94720-4600 USA
510-642-8016