Overall Critique of the 1998 ASA National Conference
Disclaimer: These are mainly areas I was disappointed with (and a couple I was impressed with). Keep in mind this is just one parent�s opinion, and a national conference �first timer� at that.
Handouts were always in short supply and I didn�t figure out why until the second day of the conference. People were taking handouts for both sessions they were attending and for sessions they could not attend but didn�t want to miss. The lessons learned are that you can�t have too many handouts and the organizers need a way of making more handouts quickly. For more than half of the sessions, I didn�t get a handout until more than half way through the talk. In a few cases, I didn�t get handouts at all.
The keynote talks in the main hall kicked off each morning. And this is a good idea. However, the layout was such that many of the slides (the more detailed ones) could not be read by those seated from the middle to the back.
Nearly all of the speakers felt constrained by the time allotted and rushed through their presentations as a result. I�m not sure what a good compromise solution is for this, but for many of the topics that are complicated to begin with, it didn�t help matters to have them talk through the points as fast as they possible could.
On the bright side, facilitated communication was roundly ignored by this year�s conference organizers and the other questionable interventions circulating were given short, inconvenient slots. Most of the presentations concerned medical research, independent living, and education and were given by people with life-long connections and dedication to at least clarifying and maybe curing autism.
My registration problem, a credit card number entered incorrectly during pre-registration, was a problem that could have been better served by the registration desk having a �unique problems� line. Instead, I had to wait in line with those registering on site, which killed the point of my registering early.
The plastic bags supplied to hold our conference materials weren�t up to the job. (Mine lost its handles by the second day.) I�ve seen conferences that distribute cloth bags and ASA should consider this.
Despite the instructions not to have children in the sessions, a few parents did. As parents who paid the $9 per hour per child to use on site child care, my wife and I found this more annoying than any distractions caused by the presence of children in the sessions.
A final note: Professional conference organizers would not invite people to a conference then have them buy individual servings of coffee, tea, and pastries. If it isn�t included in the conference fee, it should be added as a separate charge during registration. We were left to fend for ourselves in this area, which doesn�t become important until it is ignored.
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