Why give up a week of your valuable time to join us in Spain? There are several reasons that we can think of:
- The topic: the fundamental basis of ecology, the way we go about our science, the challenges we face and the needs for change.
- The relaxed environment we create for discussion, where everyone’s views are valued.
- The location: the Pyrenees in summer.
- No dark, stuffy lecture rooms and Powerpoint!
- Free-range workshopping (i.e. walking) every afternoon!
- The very reasonable price.
Our approach
Rather than take a traditional conference format and then try to inject discussion into it – which never succeeds – we design our workshops in completely the opposite direction. The entire event will be built around sessions and activities designed to stimulate discourse and to enhance the interactions. And we throw away all the things about conferences that deter open discussion. This will be a truly unique event in an amazing location in the Pyrenees! An opportunity to: exchange ideas; to pull apart contentious issues; to set challenges and goals for our work; to develop more effective collaborations within the international community; to build greater camaraderie among researchers within discipline areas; and to help our emerging researchers to more rapidly take leading roles.
This workshop, by deliberately stimulating discussion among a small group of scientists (a maximum of just 30 people), will offer you opportunities that traditional conferences and workshops have never given you! You will have the time and the opportunity to think, to discuss, to challenge one another (in a good-spirited way), and together to reach conclusions about the best ways forward. You will do this with some of the world’s top ecologists and, critically, with a strong contingent of our best young scientists. You will participate (every attendee will give given a specific role), often in very unusual ways. You will work hard but you will have a great amount of fun! Everyone will end up as a co-author on at least one scientific paper. This will be like no other ecology workshop that you have ever attended!
Doing Ecology Differently 