Update – Wednesday, March 18, 2020

It is with regret that we announce the cancellation of the 2020 National Conference scheduled to take place April 27-29, 2020 in Boston. This difficult decision was made out of deep concern for the health and well-being of our participants, speakers, staff, partners, and the broader community. GEO has been closely monitoring the spread of COVID-19 (the novel coronavirus). Based on the latest guidance from federal and state officials, it has become clear that cancellation was the right course of action in response to this global health crisis. We don’t want to put our community or those you care about in danger or risk adding to the spread of this disease.

This decision has been heartbreaking to our team of staff and member volunteers who were eager to bring that participants together to exchange the information, connections and experiences we need to foster smarter grantmaking practices that positively impact nonprofits and communities. Our National Conferences are the largest gatherings of the GEO community and we always look forward to hearing about innovative work leading to lasting change in the world. We had been holding out hope that things would take a more positive turn, but recent news has made it clear that it’s not possible for us to hold the conference.

In the coming weeks, we will be engaging GEO members to find alternative ways to share some of the content participants would have experienced in Boston. We also look forward to providing other virtual programming throughout 2020, including member calls, webinars and remote learning series. Member networks like the Capacity Building Champions, Change Leaders in Philanthropy Fellowship and Strategic Learners Network continue to connect.

Looking ahead, we urge you to cancel your airfare and hotel reservations. We are incredibly thankful to registrants who have already reached out to let us know that they want to donate their registration fees to GEO as a form of support. We appreciate this gesture, which will help us offset conference costs already incurred over the past year of planning and cancellation fees, as well as support alternative programming. We understand that not everyone is in the position to do so, so please complete this form to indicate your refund preference by April 8, 2020. We also thank you for extending our staff patience as they respond to your inquiries in the coming weeks, especially as GEO, like many organizations, has transitioned to working remotely right now as another response to the pandemic.

From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you for your commitment to the success of this conference. We deeply appreciate the nearly one thousand of you who registered to participate, the volunteer planning and host committees, presenters, sponsors, our regional partner Philanthropy Massachusetts, and peer event hosts who shared their time, perspectives, collaboration, and leadership to put together what we know would have been an inspiring program. We are sad not to be with you next month.

As we all adjust work schedules and routines in response to the pandemic, we encourage you to consider how you can support nonprofits in ways that let them do their important work even better. The organizations and communities you support are no doubt already responding to the needs arising from this situation, along with the systemic gaps and inequities crises exacerbate. We encourage grantmakers in the GEO community to make that easier for them to do. How to do so is not a mystery: the practices our community has advocated are the right ones to employ now: centering nonprofit and community needs discovered through trust-based relationships; streamlining and speeding processes to reduce administrative burdens and let nonprofits focus on the work; making larger, more flexible and longer-term grants; understanding historic and contemporary forces that will lead to differential impacts for marginalized communities; and supporting organizational, network and movement capacities for the long haul.

As you continue to seek transformational change for individuals, communities and the world, we will look forward to continuing to find ways to convene and connect you.

Thank you for being part of the GEO community,

The GEO Team

Thank you to Philanthropy Massachusetts for their partnership on this conference.