CONASTA cancelled

General announcements, eg upcoming science meetings, national lab tech seminars, Chemtalk announcements, etc.
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smeee
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Joined: 02 Jun 2006, 10:00
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CONASTA cancelled

Post by smeee »

Further to our emails regarding this year’s CONASTA, unfortunately CONASTA 69 in Canberra will not be going ahead this year due to CoVid-19 concerns. Please see the below statement from our CEO. We sincerely hope to see you at CONASTA 70 in Adelaide next year, or perhaps in a virtual setting!

I write this letter to provide you with an update on CONASTA 69 and COVID-19.

Ensuring the health and safety of our delegates, staff and the general public is our number one priority. The CONASTA 69 conference organising committee is aware of the increasing health concerns and escalating developments that have occurred over the last several days. Due to the World Health Organisation declaration of pandemic status for COVID-19 and advice we have received from our conference partners, the Australian Science Teachers Association (ASTA) Board of Directors voted unanimously that CONASTA 69 in Canberra (July 5 – 8, 2020) will no longer go ahead. ASTA staff and the conference organising committee are exploring all options for a possible virtual event and will provide an update once a final decision has been made.

As Australia’s peak representative body for Science Teachers, we adhere to the facts involved, including precautionary measures issued by the Australian Government Department of Health and the World Health Organisation.

We ask for your continued patience and understanding as staff work through all existing commitments and logistics issues associated with running a large conference. We will be in touch soon with updates about possible future events but we kindly request that you cancel any airline, hotel or other travel arrangements that you may have made.

We thank you for being a part of this conference to date and whilst the decision we have had to make is a very difficult one, we have done so in the best interests of everyone.

Kind Regards,
Shenal Basnayake
Chief Executive Officer
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