Updated March 19, 2020
Coronavirus isolation moved from a second- to first-person story in newsrooms around the U.S. Tuesday and Wednesday as journalists who attended the annual NICAR conference learned someone in attendance had tested presumptive positive for the disease.
Poynter media business analyst Rick Edmonds reported on how the cancellation of events and a drop in advertising could be a one-two punch for the media industry. At Poynter, which had scheduled in-person trainings through the rest of this year, we are evaluating the situation daily. Attendees for some seminars have been notified that their training has been postponed, and we are developing ideas to support a robust online curriculum in the interim.
Here’s a look at other journalism and media conferences that have been canceled or delayed because of the coronavirus. We’ll update this story regularly.
- SXSW, Austin, Texas, March 13-20. “‘The show must go on’ is in our DNA, and this is the first time in 34 years that the March event will not take place.” Futurist Amy Webb announced on Twitter that she’d be sharing her annual Tech Trends report and taking questions virtually.
- ASME Ellie Award presentation, New York City, March 12.
- Election training with CrowdTangle, Miami and Tampa, Florida, week of March 16. Via email, they included links to virtual training including covering elections, using CrowdTangle for local news and fact-checking.
- NPPA News Video Workshop, Norman, Oklahoma, March 15-20. “An official rescheduled date will be announced as soon as possible.”
- Journalism Association of Community Colleges, Burbank, California, March 19-21. “We will miss seeing you and your students next week, and will be in touch soon about plans for future JACC events, activities, issues and other important business.”
- Computation + Journalism Symposium, Boston, Massachusetts, March 20-21. “We hope to reschedule for the fall. We were on track for historically high attendance and saw record submissions.”
- The Power of Narrative, Boston, Massachusetts, March 20-22. On Twitter, organizers said they’d postpone until next year.
- AEJMC Southeast Colloquium, Memphis, Tennessee, March 19-21. “UofM will instead host the colloquium in a virtual format.”
- Columbia University Journalism Career Expo, New York City, March 28. “The Career Expo takes place every spring and is limited to the graduating students of Columbia Journalism School.”
- Facebook/ONA/Knight Foundation conference on local news, Detroit, Michigan, March 31-April 2. Via email: “We are postponing the Local News Summit in Detroit due to evolving concerns with coronavirus. We are taking this action out of an abundance of caution; we believe it will reduce any potential impact to our community and partners.”
- America East News Media Summit, Hershey, Pennsylvania, March 30-April 1. “We do not yet have the new dates for the conference; however, we will provide them as soon as they become available.”
- Midwest Journalism Conference, Bloomington, Minnesota, April 3-4. Via news release: All conference registrations will carry over to the next year’s event, scheduled for April 9-10, 2021.”
- Society for News Design, Washington, D.C., April 3-6. “For those that have already signed up for the event, your registration will be valid at the future workshop. Full refunds will also be available.”
- Journalism job fair, Washington, D.C., April 18. Via email from the National Association of Hispanic Journalists — which organized the event with the Georgetown University and the D.C. chapters of several other journalism associations: “We are working with the university to find a new date. Please stay tuned for more information.”
- NAB Show, Las Vegas. “We are currently considering a number of potential alternatives to create the best possible experience for our community.”
- American Society of Journalists and Authors, New York City, April 19-20. “Although there are no plans to shift the physical conference to another date later in 2020, ASJA’s leadership and staff are investigating expanded virtual options for delivering many of the scheduled educational sessions.”
- James Beard Media Awards, New York City, April 24. “The Foundation has taken the guidance of the CDC, the counsel of our legal advisors and our Board of Trustees, and has worked closely with our partners to make the decision to postpone the annual James Beard Awards to summer 2020.”
- NLGJA’s Headlines & Headliners fundraiser, New York City, April 24. Association president Sharif Durhams tweeted, “Social distancing for now, but we plan to reschedule.”
- International Symposium On Online Journalism, Austin, Texas, April 24-25. “We’ve been monitoring the COVID-19 situation closely over the past few weeks and have decided that convening in person would not be prudent at this time. We are, however, going to try to create a virtual ISOJ, where sessions would be available online.”
- Logan Symposium on Investigative Journalism, Berkeley, California, April 24-26. “…we could not in good conscience potentially endanger anyone’s health and safety in the face of the developing global outbreak of COVID-19.”
- Association of Health Care Journalists’ Health Journalism 2020, Austin, Texas, April 30-May 3. “AHCJ is trying to work with the conference hotel, the JW Marriott in Austin, to determine if there is another set of dates later in the year that might work.”
- ACES conference, Salt Lake City, April 30-May 2. “We hope you continue to join us for future conferences and are looking forward to seeing everyone in Atlanta in 2021.”
- IRE spring workshops, Miami, Pittsburgh, Salt Lake City. “Plans continue for the IRE national conference June 18-21 in National Harbor, Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C. The health of our members remains our paramount concern.”
- Collaborative Journalism Summit, May 14-15, Charlotte. “We’re moving from an in-person event to an in-place event this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. That means wherever you are, you’ll just need a device and an internet connection to participate!” Registration is free for the virtual summit.
- Canadian Association of Journalists conference, May 29-31, Montreal. In a news release March 16, association president Karyn Pugliese said, “We will shortly announce an alternative plan to honour the excellent work of this year’s nominees and winners.”
- SciLine Bootcamp, Baltimore. “This boot camp has been postponed, but will be held on a date TBD in 2020.”
- NABJ regional conferences. “At this point, we are still preparing for the 2020 convention and career fair this summer in D.C.”
- Gridiron Club spring dinner. According to Politico, the “spring dinner, which would have drawn around 600 attendees, has taken place almost every year since 1885, club historian and National Journal White House correspondent George Condon said.”
- Local Media Association, all events through July. Via email: “Stay tuned for more details.”
Related: Get our daily briefing for journalists on covering COVID-19
The readers’ guide to understanding the coronavirus
AP Stylebook tips on covering the coronavirus
How will the coronavirus impact advertising and events?
Kristen Hare covers the transformation of local news for Poynter.org. Know about a cancellation? She can be reached at khare@poynter.org or on Twitter at @kristenhare
