2013Q3 Reports: ACL 2016

ACL 2016 - report by Christopher Manning.

In 2016 there will be a joint ACL and EACL conference in Europe/Middle East/Africa. Initial steps towards the organization of the conference have begun.

We have set up the conference coordinating committee: Stephen Clark, EACL chair <sc609@cl.cam.ac.uk> Caroline Sporleder, EACL secretary <secretary@eacl.org> Mike Rosner, EACL treasurer <treasurer@eacl.org> Lluís Màrquez, EACL chair-elect <lluism@lsi.upc.edu> Christopher Manning, ACL past president in 2016 <manning@stanford.edu> Drago Radev, ACL secretary <radev@umich.edu> Graeme Hirst, ACL treasurer <gh@cs.toronto.edu> Jian Su, ACL information officer <sujian@i2r.a-star.edu.sg> Priscilla Rasmussen, ACL business manager <acl@aclweb.org>.

The committee has an email list address: acl16cc@aclweb.org .

There is a call for bids, and an updated local expenses template, which is ready for distribution (as below). We will start to make initial contact with potential bidders at ACL 2013.

For the next steps of the process, we will follow the guidelines http://aclweb.org/adminwiki/index.php?title=Conference_planning_schedule . For the next half year or so, it is most important to contact potential organisers, to ensure that we will have a number of promising bids to choose from.

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Call for Bids ACL 2016

54th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics

The Association for Computational Linguistics (ACL) invites proposals to host the 54th Annual Meeting of the ACL, to be held in Europe, the Middle East or Africa (EMEA) in June, July, or August 2016.

At this time, we seek preliminary draft proposals from prospective bidders in EMEA. Promising bidders will be asked to provide additional information for the final selection.

The ACL 2016 Coordinating Committee, made up of members of the Executive Committee of the ACL and representatives of European Chapter of the ACL (EACL), 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). Handy 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-2013-07-17.xls

Bid Highlights: Draft proposals should 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, banquet and entertainment (traditionally, dancing for participants at the banquet) Local sponsorships Local expenses estimates spreadsheet (using the template provided, link above)

Evaluation: Proposals will be evaluated according to the following criteria (unordered):

Experience of local arrangements team Local CL 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 meetings in EMEA in the decade prior to 2016 (ACL 2007 Prague, ACL 2010 Uppsala, ACL 2013 Sofia)

Important Dates: November 1, 2013 - Final Call for Bids January 15, 2014 - Notify intention to submit proposal March 1, 2014 - Draft proposals due Through March, 2014 - Feedback to bidders Apr 15, 2014 - Final bids due May 15, 2014 - Bid selected

The selected location for ACL 2016 will be announced at the ACL 2014 conference (Baltimore, USA, June 22-27, 2014).

For any queries please contact Christopher Manning, the Coordinating Committee chair. Please send notifications and draft proposals to: Christopher Manning <manning@stanford.edu>

Christopher Manning Dept of Computer Sciences, Gates 1A 353 Serra Mall Stanford CA 94305-9010 USA