2020 Conference Updates

March 19, 2020

Dear SGS conference registrants, presenters, sponsors, exhibitors and advertisers:

Due to the ongoing concerns about Novel Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19), and the impact from travel restrictions and need for social distancing, the Southern Gerontological Society Annual Meeting and Conference that was scheduled to take place April 14-18, 2020, in Norfolk, Virginia has been cancelled. This extraordinary and heartbreaking decision is responsive to the urging of health authorities and the World Health Organization (WHO) who have declared a pandemic. We have a clear need to be responsible to the realities of this virus. The health and well-being of the SGS community and the older adults we serve is our primary concern. Thank you all so much for your patience and understanding as we navigated our way through this national emergency and our hotel contract termination request, each of which ultimately led to us canceling the conference in its entirety. We would like to acknowledge and thank the SGS Board of Directors for their careful consideration given to this challenge and for their unanimous determination to protect the safety of not only our conference attendees and presenters, but also for those populations they serve.

Thank you all for your work for and support of SGS. It would have been a great conference! We would like to acknowledge our planning team and their incredible service in accepting abstracts and for planning the conference events.

To follow is our current response to the many questions we’ve received about registration fees, exhibit and sponsorship monies, presentations, and hotel reservations. If there are any additional questions, please know that we will happily provide you support and answers. The volume of communications coming our way is high, but we will respond to you as soon as possible. Thank you again for your understanding, support, patience and kindness as we move through this all, together.

Will registration fees be refunded?

We will refund conference registrations in full and without fees to those who registered for SGS 2020. We have had some people ask if they can credit their registration till next year 2021, or if they can donate the registration to the SGS Ruby Endowment fund. All of these options are available. A google form (link) is below. We ask that you indicate which option you would prefer, after which we will work with you through the process. If your employment has paid for your registration fees, we ask that you please verify their return and/or credit policies so that we can refund and/or credit fees in accordance. Because of the volume of registrations and refunds we will be processing; we kindly request your patience during this process as it will take us some time to complete.

If you have registered, please complete this form (or forward it to the person who completed your registration) regarding your preference for your registration fees paid: Go To Google Forms

What should I do about my hotel reservation?

We have been informed that the Hilton is already cancelling reservations for those who held them. Please check your email for information regarding your room status. If you have not heard from the hotel, please call the hotel directly to cancel your reservation. This can be done either through the reservation link used during booking, emailing reservations@themainnorfolk.com, by calling the MAIN directly at 757-763-6200, by calling central reservations at 1-800-HILTONS.

If you have booked a room at a different hotel other than the conference hotel, it is your responsibility to cancel your own reservation. Be sure to do this prior to your particular hotel's stated cancellation policy. If your hotel booking does not accept cancellations, we recommend still calling the local hotel, and even the chain's headquarters as the cancellation is necessary for unusual and extreme circumstances and they may be willing to work with you.

What will happen to the SGS Annual Awards Ceremony?

We are planning to host our Awards Ceremony via a live streaming this year in order to bring us all together to continue celebrating our wonderful community. Please be sure to watch for emails regarding the day and time on which we will hold this virtual event.

Are there any plans to allow presentations to be available virtually? What if I was scheduled to present?

We know our accepted presenters have worked hard and long to prepare to share knowledge and best practices and we are thankful for it. We would like to assure you all that there will be opportunities for you to do this again with SGS in the very near future. We are currently exploring several different options to provide a variety of virtual learning opportunities including virtual gallery poster presentations and by making presentations available by way of webinar format. More information will be forthcoming as soon as it is available.

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We will be connecting with each of our accepted presenters, by way of the corresponding authors who submitted through our Ex Ordo software, to determine if they would like for us to move their presentation content to the 2021 42nd Annual Meeting and Conference. This conference is scheduled to be held in Baltimore, Maryland at the Lord Baltimore Hotel from April 6 – April 10, 2021. Because the conference venue will provide us different space allocations, the presentation format for previously accepted abstracts may be altered. We assure each of our presenters that our 2021 program committee will work diligently in their assessment of the space and schedule availability and in the assignment of presentation format to this year’s previously accepted presentations.

In addition, we extend many thanks to our invited and keynote speakers.

Ishan C. Williams, PhD, FGSA
President, Southern Gerontological Society
icw8t@virginia.edu

Lee Ann Ferguson, MA
Executive Director, SGS
admin@southerngerontologicalsociety.org

March 17, 2020

Dear SGS members and 2020 Registrants,

Thank you for your patience regarding the planning of the 2020 41st SGS Annual Meeting and Conference. Thank you for your commitment to SGS and older adults. We continue to remain diligent, to the best of our ability given these unprecedented and unpredictable times, to stay updated on the most recent, vetted, and pertinent information regarding COVID-19 (coronavirus). Our utmost concern is for the health, safety, and well-being of our members, presenters, speakers, and sponsors, as well as for the clients they serve.

In light of the growing number of COVID-19 cases across the US, our organization faces having to make important decisions related to our conference in April. We know how much SGS means to everyone and we do not want to make decisions in haste.

The SGS Board is holding an emergency board meeting on Monday March 16, 2020. Updates regarding the conference will be communicated to membership and registrants by March 19, 2020. We appreciate your patience and understanding and apologize for any inconvenience. This situation is rapidly evolving, and we encourage you to please stay safe and exercise all precautions.

If you are experiencing travel bans or are concerned about your own health or for others with whom you care for, please do what you need to do individually to stay safe. We are working on a contingency plan. We want to thank the hard work of Lee Ann Ferguson (Executive Director) and Jennifer Bergantino (Helms Briscoe Global Accounts Director) identifying next steps.

You can stay updated on the latest developments on the coronavirus by accessing some resourceful websites below.

• WHO - World Health Organization
• Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
• John Hopkins University – website that tracks COVID-19

Your local and state public health departments are excellent sources of information relevant to your geographic area.

Ishan C. Williams, PhD, FGSA
President, Southern Gerontological Society