A BRIEF OVERVIEW OF CLARITY 2016 CONFERENCE

Mount Victoria, Wellington NZ Credit: Verity White

What’s the best way to start a plain language conference review article? Probably not like this.I recently attended my first Plain Language conference - the Clarity International conference in Wellington NZ.

SO.... WAS IT ANY GOOD?

Yes. (Hannah Morgan-Stone, one of my favourite conference presenters taught me to put the answer up the front).I went there solo, not knowing anyone who would be there. I trusted the Plain Language gods to introduce me to some fun and inspiring people.And the Plain Language gods delivered. I met some really interesting people and saw some great presentations!

If the Clarity International conference was a person, what kind of person would it be?

THE CONFERENCE GOERS

http://www.alanraga.com/Events/Wellington-Event/Clarity-2016/i-TrxzCh5

If the Clarity International conference was a person, what kind of person would it be?Based on 70% of attendees... an extremely friendly and helpful Caucasian female, aged between 45 - 65 with glasses, a great scarf and sensible shoes.Everyone was so lovely and happy to answer questions. Whilst all the attendees were friendly, it was a little disappointing there wasn’t more conference goers in the younger age range (or younger at heart maybe).The welcome event on the Thursday night was good fun, but there was no activities planned for the Friday night.This led a few of the younger attendees to propose a Future Clarity Night. A night for the young and young at heart to get together during the Clarity Conference and run a night of PechaKucha… and then explore the host city’s nightlife.

Who’s in?

THE COST

Forgetting the cost of the flight and the cost of accommodation, it costs $710 NZD to attend the conference (gala dinner not included). How much content to you get for your NZ dollars? Quite a bit...»Welcome Night: Opening Speeches and video presentation from Prof Kimble» Day 1: 5 Plenary speakers & 5 concurrent / speedlearning speaker sessions» Day 2: 9 Plenary & 3 speedlearning speaker sessionsThe 23 presentations of varying lengths & quality provided much food for thought, some tastier than others. Altogether, 23 presentations means around $30 per speaker.The conference cost also included drinks & canapes on the welcome night, two days of morning teas, lunches, and afternoon teas. Not to mention a bag of swag from the conference sponsors and, of course, lots of chats with other conference goers. Overall, I had a really great time and felt like it was pretty good value.

GALA DINNER

Unintentional copyright infringement = SLoppyright

Skip to the gala dinner. Now here we got a bit of fun with the excellent MC banter of James Elliot (@JamesElliot8) a semi-professional lawyer and wholly professional comedian who kept the entire room captivated and laughing all through the night.This dinner was a lovely end to the conference. At $120 NZD a head for tickets, it seemed a little steep but the food was lovely and James was genuinely entertaining so again, good value.

WOULD YOU GO AGAIN?

Yes! Whilst it would be great to see more diversity in the speakers and the ideas presented (perhaps even some controversial, heated Plain Language debates?), I am looking forward to seeing the line-up for the PLAIN Conference in Austria in 2017. If you’re going, it’s very likely I’ll see you there!

- Verity

Link city

»Photos from the conference by Alan Raga Photography

»Conference website, including videos of all main speaker presentations

»PLAIN Conference Austria 2017

MY FIRST PLAIN LANGUAGE CONFERENCE