Conference Circuit: Getting Dog Trainers to Sit and Shake Hands

Where else would you expect to find a Border Collie Team  (opens in a new tab) than at the Association of Professional Dog Trainers (APDT) annual conference and tradeshow  (opens in a new tab)?

The team of volunteers assists with day-to-day operations of the conference, from answering attendees’ questions to helping with workshops. The program also creates a pipeline for those who want to apply for conference staff positions in the future.

“If this is your first conference, it will give you a group of friends to play around with and you still have all the time you need to attend the sessions you want,” former Border Collie Skye Anderson said of the experience.

Along with a full slate of speakers  (opens in a new tab) and workshops  (opens in a new tab), the APDT conference, which will be held October 15-18 in Hartford, Connecticut, features special events like book signings  (opens in a new tab) and a 5K run/walk to raise money for the APDT Foundation  (opens in a new tab).

Though only service dogs are allowed on the conference floor, we’re hoping that attendees will fill the #APDT2014 hashtag  (opens in a new tab) with puppy pictures.

The Week Ahead

October 11-14: The National Frozen and Refrigerated Foods Association’s annual convention  (opens in a new tab) doesn’t offer attendees a chilly reception. Especially of interest is its “Taste of Excellence” event  (opens in a new tab) , which features an extensive bounty of frozen edibles  (opens in a new tab). This year’s conference will be held, ironically, in sunny Orlando, Florida.

October 11-15: New Orleans hosts the American Society of Anesthesiologists annual meeting  (opens in a new tab) this month. The association deserves kudos for its suite of digital options, from iOS  (opens in a new tab) and Android apps  (opens in a new tab) to its own online community  (opens in a new tab) where attendees can meet and greet online.

Down the Line

December 3-7: We love big ideas and big questions, and the American Anthropological Association’s annual meeting in Washington, DC  (opens in a new tab), will be loaded with them. The theme, “Producing Anthropology,” raises important questions for the field, including these: “What are our epistemological commitments to the ways we make scientific knowledge today? What impact do our epistemic convictions and predilections have, intended or not?” Attendees clearly have some deep thinking to do before descending on DC.

(Alena Ozerova/ThinkStock)