Speciforum 2021

The Specify Collections Consortium staff cordially invite our members to the Consortium’s 1st annual member meeting, “Speciforum 2021”.  The meeting will be held virtually this year, February 23 – 24 from 1 – 5 pm CST. We are excited to build on the SCC’s recent series of topical webinar and feedback sessions to organize a more broadly-focused annual forum to discuss your Specify insights, share your experiences over the past year, and listen to your feedback regarding challenges and capabilities. SCC staff will also present demonstrations and discuss current status of Specify releases along with future capabilities and plans. We welcome this annual event as a unique opportunity to and collaborate on all issues related to the Consortium’s activities.

Session One Session Two Session Three Session Four
Speciforum Technical Support

Day One | February 23

Session 1 - Where We Are and Where We Want to Be

Time

Event

Speaker

1:00 – 1:10 CST

 Opening Session
Welcome to Speciforum 2021! In this session we will welcome members, make introductions, and concisely summarize the meeting’s goals and agenda.		 J. Beach

1:10 – 1:25 CST

 State of the SCC
We continued build out the SCC’s organizational foundation in 2020, with the realization of governance and advisory committee structures. We grew membership, stabilized finances, and continued to prospect for new members in 2021.		 J. Beach

1:25 – 1:40 CST

 2020 SCC Member Engagement Events
The Specify Collections Consortium has instituted activities to advance the influence and authority of our members within the consortium. Learn how members influenced the design of new capabilities and helped set priorities in the consortium.		 N. Spears

1:40 – 2:00 CST

 Technology and Science Advisory Committees Contributions
The SCC Board is advised by volunteer members of the Science and Technology Advisory Committees. In this session, the Chairs of the Committees will report on their goals and activities in 2020.		 B. Norton, A. Rountrey

2:00 – 2:50 CST

 Computing Priorities, Workflow Aspirations, and Institutional Stakeholders
Although much of Speciforum will focus on “how” the Consortium and Specify operate, this session is aimed more at the “why” or “what for’ dimensions of your institution’s collection information computing. Using an interactive whiteboard, we will invite meeting participants to identify their top research data handling priorities, institutional goals, collection stakeholder interests, and the connections among them.		 All

2:50 – 3:10 CST

 Break

 

Session 2 - Getting Collections Computing Done

Time

Event

Speaker

3:10 – 4:40 CST

 Workflow Stories and Solutions
Specify member-led demonstrations of how they use Specify to facilitate their workflows, highlighting different ways to use Specify.
Session Abstracts		 S. Huber, José Leal, F. Steeman, N. Filippova, P. Larson, R. Rabeler, A. Bentley

4:40 – 5:00 CST

 Cat Tails and Cocktails
We invite you to ask questions of SCC staff in an informal setting. “Cat tails” because we have noticed that pets have become bolder and increasingly irrepressible in home office Zoom meetings, so we invite participants to spotlight their local ‘biodiversity’. For “Cocktails”, it may be just juice for Australian attendees at 10 AM, but have a pour of your favorite beverage ready for some non-human vignettes.		 All

Day Two | February 24

Session 3 - Specify Innovators and Capabilities

Time

Event

Speaker

1:00 – 1:45 CST

 Specify Out of the Box
New Ways to Use Specify outside of regular collections management “OOB”. We hope these examples will encourage future discussion and innovation.
Session Abstracts		 M. Costa, D. Macpeherson, W. Coetzer

1:45 – 2:15 CST

 Specify Extensions and Integrations
Members will demo extensions and integrations they have developed to extend Specify capabilities. We hope these examples will encourage future discussion and innovation.
Session Abstracts		 K. Randall, C. Gallagher

2:15 – 2:50 CST

 SCC Outreach, Engagements, and Meetings
Numerous organizations throughout the world are engaged in the advancement of the biological collections community, more than any one person or institution could traverse. Together our SCC staff and members participate in these meetings and discussions, helping to keep all of us informed and engaged.
Session Abstracts		 J. Beach, N. Klazenga, E. Haston, A. Vaughan, J. Gerbracht

2:50 – 3:10 CST

 Break
  

Session 4 - Reaching the Next Plateau

Time

Event

Speaker

3:10 – 3:40 CST

 Engineering Outlook
In this session will discuss the roadmap for Specify 6 and 7 software engineering for the next several months, including the goals, feedback, and constraints that factor into development priorities.		 J. Beach

3:40 – 4:10 CST

 Specify DOA, Digital Object Architecture and Specify Integrations
Biological collections, as a global data community, have a rare opportunity through technology-driven transformation to advance from from file-oriented, batch data transfers and one-way data pipelines, to ‘real-time’ API-based data interactions in a global network of n-way data streams. This session will highlight current interest in a digital specimen architecture, illustrate some relevant prototype Specify integrations, and consider an alternate conceptualization of collection objects and catalogs.		 J. Beach

4:50 CST

 Member Use Cases: Workflows and Capabilities
This interactive whiteboard session is aimed at gathering your responses to the information presented in Speciforum 2021 and to solicit additional feedback on specific current, planned, or other capabilities for SCC software and services in the future.		 All

4:50 – 5:00 CST

 Day 2 Meeting Wrap-Up All