Conferences Begin Offering Childcare and Other Services for Parents

Many parents today are forced to forgo the opportunity to attend a desired conference, miles from home, due to a lack of childcare. For far too long, business professionals with children have had to ask themselves, “Is this trip feasible with a baby or small child?” If the answer is no, they miss out on conferences that offer career-changing opportunities and information, such as breaking developments and industry insights. A recent article shed light on this issue and explained that some conferences are beginning to examine the issue and are committed to making changes.

The 2019 KDD conference, the premier interdisciplinary conference bringing together researchers and practitioners from data science, data mining, knowledge discovery, large-scale data analytics, and big data, introduced childcare services, and subsequently, saw the number of female attendees increase from the previous year. With such positive results, the KDD conference in 2020 will again offer childcare facilities throughout the event.

Many other conferences, in varying industries, are realizing that inclusivity should be a priority. Professionals of young children deserve the opportunity to attend and contribute to conferences, and we must make it possible for them to do so.

-Dina Barabash, NASBA Content Development & Web Specialist