Update: Association of Fundraising Professionals Joins NTEN and SXSW in Canceling Its Conference

Note: We will update this list of major national conferences as we hear about them.

The Association of Fundraising Professionals has canceled its in-person conference in Baltimore from March 29 to 31.

CEO Mike Geiger said Maryland Governor Larry Hogan’s executive order prohibiting gatherings and events with over 250 people forced AFP to cancel he event.

Geiger encouraged attendees to sign up for a virtual version of the conference.

The organization also is offering full refunds of registration fees or the option of apply registration fees to next year’s conference.

NTEN, a group of nonprofit-technology professionals, announced that it is canceling its annual conference March 24 to 26 in Baltimore.

The group initially resisted canceling, but in a video for conference attendees, CEO Amy Sample Ward said that the World Health Organization’s declaration of the coronavirus as a pandemic forced the decision to cancel.

Ward said the conference produces 62 percent of NTEN’s revenue. She said the organization will refund registration fees but she added that many attendees had already said they would forgo some or all of their refunds to support the organization “in the wake of this substantial financial hit.” Forms will be available online for those who wish to donate registration fees, Ward said.

NTEN explored the option of postponing the conference or converting it to a “virtual” event but didn’t feel those options would meet attendees’ expectations.

Ward got emotional at times in the video, especially when talking about the conference as a source of professional development, networking, and inspiration for nonprofit workers seeking social change. She said the decision to cancel had her “heart jumping back and forth between practical considerations and loftier ones.”

Other major cancellations:

• The South by Southwest Interactive Festival, an event heavily attended by nonprofits. The organization laid off about 50 employees after announcing the cancellation.

• The 2020 Skoll World Forum in Oxford. Registration fees will be refunded, and some reimbursements will be made for transportation and lodging “that have caused financial burden to you or to your organization,” Skoll said on its website. The event typically draws some of the biggest names in philanthropy, as well as celebrities like Bono and Don Henley.

• The Women’s Philanthropy Institute at Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy canceled its “Plugged In” conference in Chicago March 31 and April 1.

• Classy, an online fundraising company, canceled its June event in Boston.