Background:
The Association of Children’s Welfare Agencies (ACWA) International Conference is a major gathering of advocates, practitioners, policymakers, researchers, and leaders in the child and family welfare sector. The conference addresses topics such as family support and intervention, family preservation, domestic violence, and child protection, as well as out-of-home and residential care. Attendees from across Australia share their work, launch new research and discuss policies and practice that are improving the lives of vulnerable children and families. Arinex has a longstanding relationship with ACWA and have been their PCO partner for this conference since 2008.
Conference Highlights:
- Family and Community Services Insights Analysis and Research (FACSIAR) launched The Special Issue on Pathways of Care Longitudinal Study: A study of children in care in NSW at the Conference which is the first large-scale prospective longitudinal study of children and young people aged 0-17 years in out-of-home care in Australia. The special issue contains a collection of ten papers covering a range of topics, including: infant health and development; socio-emotional wellbeing of children; educational outcomes; placement stability and developmental outcomes; the experiences of children with a disability; restoration of Aboriginal children and parents’ experiences; and carer characteristics and well-being.
- The Welcome Reception was held at Cockle Bay Wharf in Darling Harbour, Sydney, and was attended by NSW Governor, Her Excellency the Honourable Margaret Beazley AC KC.
- In lieu of traditional speaker gifts, $300 donations were made in the speaker’s name to three charities Indigenous Literacy Foundation, ID Know Yourself and Women’s Community Shelters.
- The sponsorship revenue target was exceeded by 176%.
Challenge:
The Organising Committee were inspired to do things differently since their last conference in 2020 was postponed by four years due to the COVID-19 pandemic with the previous iteration held in 2018.
With six years of industry research and progress packed into this year’s Conference, it was decided that the program was worthy of a user experience that maximised interaction and engagement.
At one month prior to the Conference, registration numbers were lower than expected sitting below 400 when the historical attendance ranged between 600- 800 delegates.
Solutions:
- Using Arinex event technology, the team created an online, interactive version of the full Conference program that included features such as ability to search, view speaker biographies, view and download abstracts, navigate between days and add favourite sessions to personal calendars.
- A program filter option was activated which allowed an attendee to view the program through the lens of a particular theme, so only sessions within a particular topic appeared to them making it easier to plan which concurrent sessions they would attend.
- A great benefit of the online interactive program version was to connect directly to the Conference mobile app and when changes were made to the program, both the live online and app programs updated simultaneously.
- A printable copy of the program was made available on the website for attendees to view and download should they prefer a traditional hardcopy program.
Before:
After:
Click here to view the Interactive Program.
Outcome:
Over 820 attendees welcomed back ACWA 2024 Conference following a six-year break.
The interactive program was made available on the Conference website and advertised across all event and ACWA marketing channels. After the new program release, registration sales doubled in the final month leading up to the event.
Delegate Feedback
- 90% of post-event survey respondents rated the program format on the website as met or exceeded expectations.
- 94% of post-event survey respondents rated the quality and relevance of speakers as met or exceeded expectations.
“Was very provocative and relevant, great range of diverse topics pulled together really well, I registered late and was so glad I did.”
“The program was incredibly comprehensive, it made it difficult to choose! The streams were relevant and well represented by the speakers/topics. Fantastic job done by the Conference team.”
“I felt the depth and breadth of topics was really awesome – I can only imagine how hard it would have been to select and schedule all of that! Well done!”