Skip to Content

Scratch 2015 conference

« News and Announcements
27 replies [Last post]
Joek van Montfort
Member
A lot of people like the idea of another Scarcth conference in betweeen the bi-annual conferences at MIT.

Me too, but I know that's it's a lot of work and you need an incredible team some financial support ($50k to give you an idea) to get it done.

So it will only happen if we find enough reaons to gather again, a nice location, and ...

scratch2013bcn.org was announced around Christmas 2012, leavinf us with around 8 months to organize it. It's highly preferred to make the announcement earlier.

If you have an idea about where this conference should take place, if you have more than 1 month of spare time the upcoming year, if you know of a theme to focus on, ... please share your thoughts. The only thing I can guarantee about this is that if the discussions doesn't take off, it won't happen :-(

I'll start with some of my thoughts

Best regards, Joek
Replies
Lilli Meloche
Member
ScratchAMS2015, here I come!!  Just arrived in Amsterdam and am super excited about this conference... See you there!!
 
Peteri Ruutu
Member
Can hardly get better than Barcelona, wanted to thank everyone for making this possible. Still hoping the next edition will take place a little bit closer to Switzerland - we don't only have chocolate and banks, but really cool venues too ;-) Especially in the Geneva area IMO. Gold bars All the best Peteri
Joek van Montfort
Member
Thank you!

The team which organized #scratch2013bcn together with some fresh bright minds is working hard to make #scratch2015ams as inspiring.
Once againthere will be six world class invited speaekrs. New this year is our guest of honor: Logo co author Cynthia Solomon.

Be our guest and register via scratch2015ams.org/registration
Joek van Montfort
Member
The program committee is awaiting your proposals via scratch2015ams.org/join

And please note you can follow us on @Scratch2015AMS
Lilli Meloche
Member
I have submitted a poster proposal.  Upon submission there was no indication that it found its way to you.  Please advise...
Lilli  
Joek van Montfort
Member
I'll check if I can change the form to end with some confirmation. We did receive your proposal, thank you, and you should have had an email with the details of your entry. If needed yoy can reply to that message or directly contact program@scratch2015ams.org
Lilli Meloche
Member
Thanks! got the email, :)
 
Joek van Montfort
Member
Amsterdam it will be!

Please join us August 12-15 for another Scratch fest this side of the Atlantic: Scratch2015AMS creating creative communities.
Follow us on twitter and don't forget to send your proposals before March 15th.
 
Kok Soon Ho
Member
Hi Joek,
Can I find out whether there is a form for us to fill up for proposal submission for Scratch2015AMS?
Frank Sabaté
Member
The form for proposals submission will be available soon. We will announce it on ScratchED but you can also follow us on Twitter at @Scratch2015AMS 
Thanks!
Frank
Bernat Romagosa
Member
These are great news!

Congratulations on the initiative, and count on us for anything you need! :)

We'll start preparing our submissions soon.
Joek van Montfort
Member
Saturday January 17th ther will be a kick off meeting in Amsterdam. If you think you could contribute in that meeting contact me.

Joek

UPDATE

It looks like we'll have a pre-conference!
Confirmed for the warming up and set up are:
Jens Moenig and Ralf Romeike form Germany
Samir Saidani and Claude Terosier from France
Agnese Addone from Italy
Margaret Low from England
a bunch of locals and last but not least
Mitch Resnick in the hangout Saturday 5PM CET

Those arriving Friday 16th may be part of a special fundraise event :-)

Stay tuned, this feels good
Susan Ettenheim
Member
Joek - I would love to help this time. Let me know what I can do from NYC! I will likely come because it was just so wonderful even though I am not a world traveler - for Scratch - anything! Especially as this move to learn to code grows, it seems so important to remember that we are about creative coding. My students are so enjoying working with Scratch and Kinect and Makey Makey. I would love to expand my own knowledge of Scratch and the real world. I am amazed at how easily my students are building blocks with the new Build a Block feature. I would love to learn more about how to help them grow smart Scratch coding skills for their wonderful imagination projects!
Joek van Montfort
Member
Thank you Susan! When heading for Amsterdam take some extra days :-)

Tom -Hummingbird- Lauwers sponsors with € 500 and suggests that other companies who feel support of the the Scratch community could do the same. Finding out who at Sparkfun, Adafruit, LittleBits, NoStarchPress is taking care of such matters is something that's more easily done from the US I think ...

 
Susan Ettenheim
Member
Joek - it's not happening - me coming to Amsterdam - but maybe by hangout? :)
Joek van Montfort
Member
I want to organize a Scratch Conference in Amsterdam second half of August. That's either August 12-15 or August 26-29 (The in between week the city is expecting 1.5 million visitors for Sail2015 which drives hotel rates to unaffordable.).

We need external funding of € 25.000 That's dirt cheap if you remember what scratch2013bcn.org brought us for this kind of money. My experience learned me that most people prefer to spend their money on other things. E.g. yesterday I received a "no" from Google RISE Awards.

If we don't secure funding before mid January I want to cancel the project (or hand over to someone else wanting to take the risk). 

I've funds to organize one preparation meeting. If you are available for a meeting in Amsterdam the second weekend of January 2015, working Saturday 10 and/or Sunday 11, you're welcome to help kick-off this event.

If you want part of the program to be scientific (peer reviewed / published in proceedings) and are available for a committee taking care of that let me know right away as this needs more time.

Joek@xota.nl







 
Roberto Catanuto
Member
Hi, I'm sorry I couldn't make it to Barcelona last year.
This time I'm willing to participate, and to help out if I can be of any help.

It'd be difficult for me to reach places outside Europe or the US (East Coast).
But I'll keep me posted with your work.

Best.
Joek van Montfort
Member
Every now and then I got an email with suggestions/questions/etc. on the 2015 conference.

Once again, you better share your thoughts here as 
  • it's not me who takes decisions
  • I can take a decision like scratch2013bcn, but so can you
  • emails to me don't work for community building
  • scratch2013bcn was a community effort, see the organizers page
  • scratch2013bcn depended strongly on private persons making donations (and for sure I don't want to ask these people again)

I think on the possibillity of a conference daily. Was thinking of doing an opne invitation for organizers meeting in Amsterdam mid november or in Berlin during Wipsce 5-7  november. But first I want to have sponsorships for approx $25000, so I'm sure we can do without a deficit. I applied for Google RISE funding, pray your buddha.

As for places I reduced my options to Barcelona, Amsterdam and Berlin. You need to know the town a little (and have strong local partners) to set up a conference in a friendly afforable sphere (i.e. oppostite of venet organizers / conference center kind of meeting). Once again, other cities may equally qualify but should bring their own lead organizer.

There's no rule that says next conference is in Europe. There will be Asian Scratcher Forum at 8 November, Korea (info?) If the people present there manage to form a team for an Asian Scratch Conference next summer I'll happily postpone European initiative to 2017. Same goes for a Snap-Invites-Scratch-Fest on US west coast.

Please make some noise here so people can see it's worth their time to start organizing.

Joek



 
Jesús Moreno
Member
I had a wonderful time at MIT this summer and I really love the idea of having another Scratch conference on 2015, so you can count on me to help in anyway.

Jesús M.
Joek van Montfort
Member
And maybe the Scratch minded people present at Mozilla fest should spend a coffe break on this matter!
 
Bernat Romagosa
Member
First of all, thanks a lot for all the compliments!

Although we think it'd be more interesting to spread the Scratch movement to other locations, we'll be happy to offer the Citilab to host the Scratch Conference again, if needed.

The Citilab has a commitment with the Scratch family, and it will we a pleasure for us to help organize the Scratch Conference 2015.
dorsaf benna
Member
The Delegation of the Great Maghreb scratch represented by  the organization EIM " for excellent computing teaching"  was present in Barcelona and we presented an idea on what is happening in Tunisia and attempts to attract the intention of Algeria and Morocco on the benefits of teaching scratch for children. This summer we're not able to be present due to distance and travel cost. We strongly suggest opting for an eurpean country in 2015. Thanks for the good times in Barcelona :)
Vivian Chow
Member
Hello everyone

I was just looking at the slide summary from the last conference in Barcelona http://creativecomputerlab.com/ScratchConf2013.pdf  They sure covered an amazing amount of stuff and all very exciting stuff too! :)

I would be interested in helping out with the next conference if it is in Europe (or Canada but I think you're looking for a place outside of North America).   It would really be helpful for someone to outline what the needs are, so I have a clear understanding of what that might entail.  I've never been involved in hosting or helping organize a conference before, so maybe this would be way beyond my abilities.  :)

I live in Switzerland, but usually spend my summers in Canada but I can be "wherever" really, if it is summer time.

How do we go about chosing a venue (a country)?  Does someone just volunteer a venue and what does the venue have to provide in terms of rooms, exhibitions halls, IT infrastructure...?  Is is expected that the venue be offered free of charge?

Sorry for the questions.  You can tell I'm a detail-oriented person. :)

~Vivian

 
Pratibha Srinivasan
Member
Hi Joek --- Thanks for taking the initiative on this. I was thinking about it, and Bangalore weather will just not be good in June/July. So I think the options should be somehwere in Europe or Berkeley. 
Joek van Montfort
Member
The main reason for organizing scratch2013bcn was to bring the extremely warming 2012 conference to Europe. And the original suggestion made at the 2012 conference was to use the odd years for conferences on other continents. Thinking that way: Incheon (Korea) or Bangalore (India) would be great places to give much more Asians access to the nice event a scratchconference is. This, however will only work if someone from the area stands up and takes the lead.

A lot of Europeans truly enjoyed the Barcelona conference and if a lot of people are in favour of another European edition I'm totally happy to take the lead. Another Citilab edition will benefit largely from the experience in 2013 and is a good option (I love the place!) Reaching out to Eastern parts of Europe is also a good idea. Places coming to mind: Berlin, Austria, Budapest, ...

And then there's a third option mentioned by Brian Harvey: Berkeley, California. I assume such a place will be attractive to Asians, Americans and Europeans alike ...



 
Anders Berggren
Member
I went to Barcelona last year, and I had one of my best times ever. The Citilab was just a perfect spot in my opinion. There are a newborn interest in Scratch, coding and education in Sweden at the moment, so somewhere in Europe would be absolutely fantastic. Of course I would love to go to Berkeley CA, but it might be to expensive. Berlin is another fantastic town, but Citilab might be even better. I really want to go to Barcelona (why not 5 days ?:) it's all about collaboration and socialisation).

Keep up the good work with bringing Scratchconference to Europe.

 
Karen Brennan
Member
I agree that Barcelona was an amazing venue! I saw some mention of Tokyo on Twitter and thought that was a wonderful idea as well!