Countdown to IPC2021The Call for Papers closed on 15 May with 1,640 papers from approximately 1,327 authors in 95 countries across Asia, Europe, Africa, North America, and Latin America. The most popular themes for submissions were in the areas of Fertility, Family Planning and Sexual and Reproductive Health, Health and Morbidity, Mortality and Longevity, and Data and Methods. A large number of submissions also selected COVID-19 as a keyword. A big thanks to all who submitted an abstract!
Submissions have now been reviewed. Each paper received peer reviews from two of the 270 volunteer population experts recruited from the IUSSP membership and individuals recommended by the theme conveners. Theme conveners will have until mid-August to create session proposals drawing on the high-quality papers identified by reviewers whose authors are available to present in the same time slot. The International Organizing Committee will review the proposals and approve the scientific programme in early September. By 15 September we will notify authors of their abstract’s status.
Scientific Programme The conference will offer up to 6 streams of regular oral sessions over a 12 to 16-hour daily time range to enable presenters and attendees from across the globe to participate at convenient hours. All sessions will be available in video replay. Conveners have the option to create classic sessions with four 12 to 15-minute presentations or flash sessions with up to seven 6-minute presentations. Poster sessions will offer authors the opportunity to chat and meet live with conference attendees during the 30-minute breaks between sessions. All poster presenters can include a short two-minute video presentation in addition to posting a PDF of the poster.
Invited Sessions In addition to sessions created from the Call for Papers, the International Organizing Committee (IOC) plans to create a stimulating programme of invited keynotes, debates and roundtable forums that will be featured each day of the conference.
Research Leader Sessions are another excellent contribution to the Conference Programme. Organizers have reserved up to 20 session slots. Institutions interested in showcasing the results of a recent research project or raising awareness of their organizations work in the field are encouraged to send a proposal to ipc2021@iussp.org by 15 September.
Sponsorship and Exhibits A virtual platform offers innovative opportunities to reach a large international audience. Options include sponsoring sessions, themes, simultaneous interpretation, and an exhibit where organizations can post a short video, links to the organizational home page and other information as well as arrange virtual meetings with conference attendees.
Side Meetings For those interested in organizing a “side-meeting” in association with IPC2021, we will gladly post pre-conference or post conference virtual side events on the IPC2021 website. Please write to ipc2021@iussp.org with your meeting’s title, short description, contact person and a link to a registration page or Zoom, Teams, or Google Meet link. Organizers will have to provide their own virtual meeting space.
Host a Conference Hub Does your institution have a meeting room or classroom equipped with an internet connection, video screen and camera, and can install Zoom? If so, you can transform it into an IPC2021 Conference Hub! The meeting room then connects to the IPC2021 platform with a user log-in created by registering as a participant. Once you log in the room to the virtual conference platform, your IPC 2021 Hub is active, and you can invite a room of students or colleagues to view a live session and participate in Q&A, or watch earlier sessions as an on-demand video.
Virtual Platform OpenWater will provide the virtual platform and support services for IPC2021. They recently provided the platform for the 2021 annual meeting of the Population Association of America so many of the features will be familiar to some of you.
In the countdown to the conference, we will be organizing a series of special webinars and virtual training workshops which you can read about here. There will be plenty taking place in the coming months, and already the reviews coming in on papers indicate that IPC2021 promises a rich and exciting programme of sessions and papers. We hope to see all of you there! |
