The AMS Scientific and Technological Activities Commission Committee on Severe Local Storms is soliciting proposals from co-Chairs for the 32nd AMS Severe Local Storms Conference (SLS) to be held in 2026. We are looking for teams of 2 people to lead the conference, with support from the SLS STAC and the AMS Meetings Department. Proposals are due June 8th, 2024.
Note: The co-chairs selected for the 32nd Conference on Severe Local Storms are also expected to serve a 3-year term on the SLS STAC Committee beginning January 2025, which would require regularly attending STAC meetings and providing conference planning updates. Conference Chairs generally begin work on planning ~18 months prior to a conference, and lead the effort to choose a location, form a program committee, generate a call for papers, manage abstract review, build the technical program, etc.
Here are some helpful guidelines for a successful proposal:
• No single Chairs; must be a team of 2 people.
• Proposal should be only one-page (single spaced).
• Proposals should identify and justify an overarching theme and organization of the conference program including possible sessions, describe how this plan will appeal to the diverse members and interest groups of the SLS community, and list any possible innovations to the traditional execution of the conference.
• Indicate the skills that the candidates possess that would qualify them to serve as co-chairs, including, but not limited to: discussing past experiences in organizing conference activities, evaluating abstracts, logistical skills acquired through non-conference experiences, and other relevant tasks.
• Identification of possible locations for holding the conference is encouraged, but not required. If the proposers desire to identify a location, they should present evidence (separately from the 1-page writeup) that their location would be financially feasible to attendees and comparable to other venues where SLS was held in the past.
• Co-chair teams will be considered based on the quality of their proposal to facilitate practical communication of knowledge within the SLS community, and to appeal to a broad diversity of participants. Such diversity in participants includes those with different academic backgrounds, career stages (e.g., students, early-, mid-, or late-career professionals, etc.) and tracks (e.g., academia, private sector, research labs, and operations), demographics (e.g., age, gender, and ethnicity), and job perspectives (physical science, social science, operations and forecasting, communication of weather threats, etc.) who use a wide variety of scientific research techniques including observations, surveys, idealized or real-data numerical simulations, data assimilation, and theoretical work.
If you have any questions, or would like to submit a proposal, please contact the AMS SLS STAC Vice-Chair: Christopher Melick ([email protected])