Information for Meetup Organizers

To sign up as an organizer, please contact Charles Kemp at

To help you publicize the event, we’ll supply you with a list of members of the Cognitive Science Society who live in your city (the list will include only members who opted in to receiving email communications). The following resources may also be helpful.

• Registration form: A Google form provides a simple way for people to register for your meetup. An example from 2021 is here.
• Website: Consider creating a simple website for your meetup. One option is to use Google Sites and an example created on this platform is here. An example of a website built in R and hosted on GitHub is here.

If we can help with your meetup in other ways, please let us know!

Meetup Format

The format and structure of each meetup is at the discretion of the local organizer – different models might work well in different places and may afford an opportunity for experimentation and innovation. Some elements that could potentially be included are listed below, and the programs for the 2021 meetups may also spark some ideas. In particular, 2021 schedules are available for the Boston, Hong Kong, San Francisco and Singapore meetups

Small group discussions
The goal of these discussions is to promote face-to-face interaction. One approach is to ask each person in each group to introduce themselves to their group and to describe what they are working on. The groups could then be shuffled to ensure that everyone gets a chance to interact with a wide range of attendees.

Talks, flash talks or posters
Some of the content may overlap with content presented at the main conference — for example, researchers who are presenting “flash talks” at the main conference may appreciate the chance to discuss their work in person with a local audience. But the workshop need not focus on work submitted to CogSci 2022 — the workshop may provide an opportunity for researchers in the local cognitive science community to share work presented at other conferences, or simply to discuss their latest ideas.

A town hall session to discuss the local cognitive science community
This session could provide a chance to plan local community-building activities and events. A session along these lines was an effective component of the Singapore 2021 meetup.

Mentoring session
This session might involve small group discussions in which early career researchers discuss their next steps with more senior researchers. To make this happen the registration form for the event would need to ask participants if they’d like to participate in a mentoring program. A mentoring program was included as part of the Boston 2021 meetup.

CogSci 2022 viewing session
If multiple people from the same city are participating remotely, they may wish to book a room with a projector at a local university so that all of them can get together to view plenary talks and attend conference sessions. Whether this approach makes sense will depend on the local timezone.

Lunch, dinner, or drinks
An informal gathering at a local restaurant or cafe.

When and Where

The date, location and target audience are also at the discretion of the local organizer. Some possibilities are described below.

• Date: Holding a meetup during the conference (July 27 – 30) will make sense in many cases, but meetups may also occur outside of this period. For example, scheduling a meetup for after the conference may allow people who travelled to Toronto to also participate in a local event.
• Location: Meetups with an academic component may take place at a local university using conference rooms and lecture theatres that are accessible to the local organizer.
• Audience: A meetup may be designed for people who participate regularly in the annual CogSci conference, but in some cities it makes more sense to target the broader cognitive science community, including people who currently have no real connection with the conference. Regardless of the target audience, a meetup group should be open to all — no conference registration is required unless an attendee is presenting work at the central conference, in which case they will register like any other conference attendee.

Interactions between meetups and the main conference

Meetups are welcome to stream content from the main conference, but meetups will generally not send content back to the main conference. One reason is scheduling — given the many constraints on the conference timetable, it won’t be possible to schedule all of the talks from a given city to take place in the same session or even on the same day. A second reason is that the question period after each conference talk will be moderated by the team at Toronto, which makes it difficult for meetup talks to double as talks at the main conference.

Code of Conduct

Each meetup group should be carried out under the Code of Conduct described below, and we ask that you include this Code of Conduct on your meetup website. The meetup organizer is responsible for communicating this code of conduct to attendees and upholding it during the event.
Meetup groups are open to all and should provide an environment in which diverse participants may learn, network, and enjoy the company of colleagues. All forms of harassment are prohibited, and specific prohibited behaviors include but are not limited to the following:

• Harassment or intimidation based on gender, gender identity, gender expression, age, sexual orientation, disability, appearance, body size, race, ethnicity, political orientation and views, religion (or lack thereof), or other group status
• Unwelcome behavior or comments related to the above categories that create a hostile environment (e.g., sexist or racist jokes)
• Sexual harassment or intimidation, including unwelcome sexual attention
• Harassing photography or recording
• Stalking
• Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behavior

Enforcement
Any attendee asked to stop harassing behavior or other behavior in violation of the Code of Conduct is expected to comply immediately. The meetup organizer reserves the right to take actions in order to keep the event a welcoming environment for all participants. These actions may range from simply warning the offender to asking that person to leave.

Reporting
If you are being harassed, notice that someone else is being harassed, or have any other concerns, please report this to the meetup organizer immediately. You can make a report either personally or by emailing your report to the organizer (contact details will be available on the local meetup page)