Charlotte Harbor Watershed Summit: Call for oral and poster presentations

Deadline extended to 9 a.m. Monday, Oct. 17, 2016

The Charlotte Harbor National Estuary Program (CHNEP) is a partnership to protect the natural environment of Florida from Venice to Bonita Springs to Winter Haven. Every three years the CHNEP hosts the Charlotte Harbor Watershed Summit to learn about current research and restoration efforts and critical environmental issues affecting the Charlotte Harbor watershed, to review progress and to bring stakeholders together.

The 2017 Summit Planning Committee is working to offer the summit as an opportunity to share the latest findings and to network.The summit will be held Tuesday-Thursday, March 28-30, 2017, at the Charlotte Harbor Event & Conference Center (75 Taylor St., Punta Gorda). We encourage you to share your work in an oral or poster presentation to advance the knowledge and understanding of the natural environment in the CHNEP study area. Presentations will be selected by the Summit Planning Committee based on relevance and timeliness. There is no fee to submit an abstract or to present. We anticipate that as many as thirty (30) proposals for 20-minute presentations will be selected. The number of posters accepted will be determined in part by the size of the facility. A lightning-round session may also be offered of short (maybe 5 minute) presentations.

To submit your proposal for an oral or poster presentation, complete an online form at https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/CHNEPSummit2017 by 9 a.m. Monday, Oct. 17 (extended from Sept. 30, 2016). You may make changes to the form after it is saved, but we recommend that you have the abstract (500 words maximum) written prior to beginning the form so it can easily by pasted into the form. An email message will be sent from maran@chnep.org to the person identified as the first author. By November, we will send a selection notice along with guidance to register, any opportunities to revise material submitted, etc.

Sponsors sought. The Charlotte Harbor Watershed Summits are only possible because of those who are willing to share their expertise and research findings and our partners and sponsors. Sponsors, as of Oct. 3, 2016, include:

• Mote Marine Laboratory ($2,000)
• Southwest Florida Water Management District ($1,000)
• Mosaic ($1,000)
• Friends of Charlotte Harbor Estuary, Inc. ($500+fiscal host)
• Science and Environment Council of Southwest Florida ($250)
• Florida Gulf Coast University College of Arts and Sciences ($250)
• Linda Elligott ($120)

Any donation of $100 or more will be acknowledged as a sponsor. Sponsor support will be accepted by the Friends of Charlotte Harbor Estuary, Inc., the CHNEP nonprofit arm. Sponsor support will be acknowledged in all materials produced after a pledge is received. Email maran@chnep.org with your pledge.The sooner we know of your support, the more ways it can be recognized. Knowing how much financial support is available also makes it easier to make decisions on how to proceed. Your sponsor support may be mailed as a check to CHNEP Friends, PO Box 511422, Punta Gorda FL 33951 or sent through PayPal (see www.CHNEPfriends.org).

Because of the support of CHNEP's financial partners and event sponsors, prior summits have been free to attend with lunches provided. In 2017, we anticipate it will again be free to attend. We are hoping to provide lunch to presenters and sponsors, but others will be required to purchase lunch. Anticipated lunch cost will be $15 a day.

We expect at least 200 people will attend the summit, some in person and others will attend remotely via WebEx. Abstracts will be compiled in proceedings that will be available online. After the summit, the presentations (oral and poster) will be made available as PDF files and videos will be made of oral presentations (combining audio with PDF of PowerPoint). Based on your input when you complete the online proposal form and funds available, there may also be an opportunity to publish in a peer-reviewed journal.

Additional details are posted at www.CHNEP.org/Summits.