The Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association (SUMA) is inviting proposals for education sessions at the 2024 SUMA Convention and Tradeshow in Regina, Saskatchewan April 14 to 17, 2024. We are looking for topics that are current and focused on key aspects of urban government that will be beneficial to elected officials and municipal administrators of villages, towns, northern municipalities, resort villages, and cities.
Who Attends?
Approximately 1,000 delegates attend the convention, including elected officials, city managers, and chief administration officers from cities, towns, villages, resort villages, and northern municipalities throughout Saskatchewan. Our annual convention is an event where municipal decision makers come to network, share leading practices, and find collaborative partners to support their communities moving forward. You can expect 50-250 participants in your session. Sessions are recorded and are available on the SUMA YouTube channel following the event.
Why Present?
Being a presenter is an outstanding way to share your knowledge and expertise, leading to professional visibility, recognition, credibility, and influence in the future of Saskatchewan’s urban municipalities.
- Great exposure for the resources and services offered by you and your organization.
- Help elevate the knowledge base of Saskatchewan’s municipal leaders.
- Excellent networking opportunity.
- Opportunity to build relationships with SUMA, the voice of Saskatchewan’s hometowns.
Session Format
SUMA is looking for presentations that reflect an understanding of the challenges of urban municipalities of all sizes, particularly of those with populations under 5,000, who are able to provide innovative and engaging presentations that will captivate the audience. We encourage presentations that go beyond the lecture format and incorporate participation from the audience through group work, polling, question and answer, tangible resources, and any other ideas you have. Sessions are approximately 1.25 hours in length. You are encouraged to discuss how your presentation will incorporate audience engagement, and the size of municipality that your presentation would be focused on in your submission.
Session Objectives
The theme for the 2024 SUMA Convention is reFRESH reNEW reFOCUS. This theme reflects the upcoming changes in municipalities with the 2024 municipal elections, and SUMA’s transformation through our Governance review. Municipalities and SUMA will be moving towards a “Fresh New Focus” throughout 2024 and we aim to highlight connection and growth through transitions. Your presentation should focus on awareness and knowledge of issues important to urban municipalities in Saskatchewan, keeping in mind that most of Saskatchewan’s urban municipalities are villages and towns.
We are looking for creative, out-of-the-box speakers to share their knowledge. We are open to suggestions for topics; however, we have identified the following topics as main concerns to urban municipal governments:
- Municipal succession planning
- Roles and responsibilities of elected officials
- Emergency response preparedness
- Municipal customer service
- Regional collaboration
- Cyber security
- Municipal relationships with First Nations communities
- Mock council meeting
- Municipal boundary alterations
- Property assessment
- Roles of a municipality in mental health and addictions
You are encouraged to highlight which topic(s) your session will be addressing in your submission.
Other Information
We will provide a complimentary one-day registration for the day of the presentation. As a not-for-profit association, SUMA does not typically provide honoraria for session presenters but is willing to consider all submissions that are accepted.
Selections will be made by the Convention Planning Committee based on several criteria, including topics and benefits to delegates.
If you are interested in convention sponsorship opportunities or having a booth at the tradeshow, contact marketing@suma.org for more information.
How to Apply
If you are interested, please fill out the form below by November 9, 2023. Please ensure to fill out all the fields marked with an asterisk, these are required and the form will not submit if they are left blank.
Please note that this form is not able to be saved. It must be completed in one session - prolonged inactivity will cause it to time out.
If you are unable to complete this form, you can download a fillable .PDF here, and email it to education@SUMA.org
