[obml] ISAO 2023 - Save the dates -> July 10-14 (Interdisciplinary School on Applied Ontology held in Sherbrooke, Canada)

[Frank Loebe]

Ready for a fiesta in ontology education? If YES, please save the dates! 
Early expressions of interest are welcome and considered non-binding.


= Announcement of ISAO 2023 [1] =

The Interdisciplinary School on Applied Ontology (ISAO) is the premier 
educational forum for acquiring and deepening knowledge in ontology - 
its foundations, applications, and interconnections with related areas.

July 10-14, 2023
University of Sherbrooke, Québec, Canada
(in person only, _no_ online participation)

[1] https://fois2023.griis.ca/isao-2023/

Target audience
- PhD students
- PostDocs and researchers
- Ontology practitioners from business, industry and society

Leading experts in applied ontology (AO), formal ontology, modeling, 
semantics and neighboring fields teach various basic courses as well as 
engage in interactive formats for deepening the knowledge of all 
participants, providing a full immersion experience in AO for all levels 
of expertise. As yet, facilitators include M. Gruninger, N. Guarino, G. 
Guizzardi, R. Hoehndorf, M. Keet, O. Kutz and B. Smith (more info below).


== Important Dates & Schedule ==
(coarse structure, as of February 2023)

- Registration not before late March 2023
- Event on July 10-14 (Mon-Fri)
  - ca. 3 days (July 10-12/13) of courses (rather introductory)
  - ca. 2 days (July 13-14) of interactive formats (introductory to 
advanced)

We aim at keeping fees to a minimum (TBD, cf. below) and offering 5-day 
and 2-day registrations. Cheap accommodation options ease expenses 
preferentially for student participants. Grants, if any, depend on 
external funding.

Early expressions of interest, though perceived as non-binding, support 
us in budgeting lower fees.

With any issues regarding ISAO 2023, please contact us at
[2] iaoa.isao2023 at gmail.com

Please feel invited to read more details below and to join in July.

Best regards,
Frank Loebe and Daniele Porello







= Details as of February 2023 =

== Content of Courses ==
(shall include, as of Feb 2023)

- AO overview
- ontological analysis and principles
- top-level ontologies
  - confirmed: tutorial on BFO (by Barry Smith)
- bio-ontologies
- representation of and logics for ontologies
- ontology engineering, managements and methods
- relations to
  - conceptual modeling
  - cognitive science
  - machine learning & artificial intelligence
  - semantic web & knowledge graphs
  - terminology


== Facilitators ==

*Michael Gruninger*
(Semantic Technologies Lab, University of Toronto, Canada)

*Nicola Guarino*
(Laboratory for Applied Ontology (LOA), ISTC-CNR, Trento, Italy)

*Giancarlo Guizzardi*
(Semantics, Cybersecurity and Services, University of Twente, The 
Netherlands)

*Robert Hoehndorf*
(Bio-Ontology Research Group, King Abdullah University of Science and 
Technology (KAUST), Thuwal, Saudi-Arabia)

*Maria Keet*
(Knowledge Engineering, University of Cape Town, South Africa)

*Oliver Kutz*
(Cognitive and Conceptual Modeling Research Group, Free University of 
Bozen-Bolzano, Italy)

*Barry Smith*
(National Center for Ontological Research, Buffalo, New York, USA)

+ few pending inquiries


== Fees, Expenses & Grants (tentative info) ==

- ISAO fees remain TBD (soon), aiming low, near former amounts
- former editions' fees at ISAO history pages [3] range from
  - students: 150 EUR/160 USD/210 CAD (early) to 300 EUR/320 USD/420 CAD 
(late)
  - regular:  250 EUR/265 USD/350 CAD (early) to 500 EUR/530 USD/700 CAD 
(late)

- budget accommodation available
  in university student housing (single or double rooms) below 35 EUR/40 
USD/50 CAD per night per person
- depending on outstanding 3rd party funding decisions, grants may 
materialize for
  - waiving or reducing ISAO fees
  - covering budget accommodation
  - partial coverage of travel expenses (if at all, in very few cases)


== Location Details ==

University of Sherbrooke
2500, boulevard de l'Université
Sherbrooke, Québec
Canada J1K 2R1


== Associated Events ==

Co-located with and
- preceding FOIS 2023 [4],
  the International Conference on Formal Ontology in Information Systems
  held from July 17-20 in person and September 18-20 online
- sharing selected sessions with EINS 2023 [5]
  the first Interdisciplinary Summer School in Digital Health
  (École d'été interdisciplinaire en numérique de la santé; primarily in 
French)

Complementing ESAO [6], the Educational Series of Applied Ontology, a 
continuous series of virtual educational sessions.


== Organization ==

The ISAO series is run by the International Association for Ontology and 
its Applications (IAOA) [7] and is held jointly with FOIS every two 
years, typically in the week just before. ISAO 2023 is the 5th instance, 
after 2012/14/16/18 and 5 years of an undesired gap, and hosted by the 
University of Sherbrooke, Québec, Canada.

Thanks to local organization support in 2023 by
- Jean-François Ethier
- Christina Khnaisser
- Anne-Marie Cloutier
- Angèle Gosselin
- Sarah Bilodeau
- Maryse Couture
- Karine Gagnon
- Jeanne Morin

General Chairs
- Frank Loebe     (University of Leipzig, Germany)
- Daniele Porello (University of Genoa, Italy)


== Contact ==

[2] iaoa.isao2023 at gmail.com


== References ==

[1] ISAO 2023 website
https://isao2023.griis.ca/

[2] ISAO 2023 contact to chairs by email
iaoa.isao2023 at gmail.com

[3] ISAO history pages
https://iaoa.org/index.php/isao-history/

[4] FOIS 2023 website
https://fois2023.griis.ca/

[5] EINS 2023 website
https://eins.griis.ca/

[6] ESAO series website
https://wiki.iaoa.org/index.php/Edu:ESAO

[7] IAOA website
https://iaoa.org/