Hello all,

The Galaxy Community Conference has been held annually since 2010. GCC2016 will be held June 25-29 at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana, United States.

We are now seeking proposals from organizations interested in hosting GCC2017.

Galaxy's informal policy of rotating between North America and elsewhere every other year is now a formal policy: Hosts for GCC2017 need to be located outside of North America.

GCC draws 200+ participants from data-intensive life science research. Participants come from around the world, from all career stages, and do research spanning the tree of life. Universities, hospitals and medical schools, research organizations, and industry are all represented, including some of the largest and most influential research organizations in the world.

What do you need to host GCC2017, you ask? In approximately decreasing order of importance:

• Enthusiasm to plan and organize several events over 5 days for more than 200 people.

• Space for 4-6 parallel training sessions over two full days, with each space able to accommodate 25 to 75 participants.
• Central meeting space with capacity for 250-300 people.
• Affordability (or access to sponsorship funds; there's a reason we've always held GCC in academic settings)
• Nearby space for breakouts, poster sessions and sponsors.
• Nearby space for lunch, coffee breaks.
• Good wifi for all events (that's 200+ people and their devices).
• Space for hackathons for 2 days before the event.
• Easy to get to by air.
• Nearby, affordable housing, or easy walking distance or easy public transport from lodging options to conference facilities
• Close proximity to a pub and other social hubs.

Hosts get copious (and enthusiastic) organizational support from Galaxy's Outreach Team (who have been helping to organize GCC since 2011), and even more copious gratitude (even adulation!) from the Galaxy Community.

See the full call for host proposals for more details on what should be covered in proposals. Proposals are due by the end of 30 October 2015. If you are interested in possibly hosting GCC2017 then please contact Galaxy Outreach with any questions. Our goal is to announce GCC2017 at GCC2016 this coming June.

Hoping to work with you in 2017!

Dave Clements and the Galaxy Team

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