"When will we have SAS Global Forum in person again?"

This is the top question I hear from SAS users: in person, on the community, in emails and social media. After a long hiatus from in-person events, these people are seeking the return of SAS connections for all of these reasons:

• They have SAS tips and experiences that they want to share with their peers.
• They miss their SAS friends -- fellow users and SAS staff who they have come to know at past conferences.
• They are a little fatigued (maybe more than a little) with virtual events -- nothing beats an in-person connection!

The great news is that we will have a live, in-person conference for SAS users in September 2023. It's called SAS Explore. Thousands of you have attended the virtual version of SAS Explore in 2022; now it's time to plan to meet in person (Sept 11-14 in Las Vegas)!

SAS Explore is for SAS users

SAS Explore 2023 is like SAS Global Forum events of the past in the most important ways:

• This event is focused on users: data scientists, developers, SAS programmers. If your hands are on the keyboard making SAS work for your organization, this conference is for you.
• This conference needs your contributions! Many of you have experiences, expertise and tips that your fellow SAS users can learn from.

Like past conferences, the call for content invites your presentations about any topic of interest to your fellow SAS users: SAS programming, analytics and AI, working with open source, APIs, administration, industry solutions and more. And topics that apply to any SAS platform are fair game: SAS 9, SAS Viya, SAS in the cloud or on-premise.

We have a SAS Explore Advisory Board made up of SAS community members (including some past SAS Global Forum leaders) and experts at SAS who will review ALL submissions and help to set the conference agenda. We are eager to see your ideas!

SAS Explore 2023 does have some notable differences when compared to past conferences:

• This conference is focused on SAS users, and is not combined with an "executive" event. We have a different event called SAS Innovate (happening next week!) that is focused on business leaders and industry networking.
• Accepted presenters will not be asked to write a conference paper. Like other technology conferences in our industry, we are focused on the sharing of expertise in person. Of course you may have materials to share (presentation deck, code and other assets), and we will host these materials on the SAS Explore hub as we did last year.

For SAS users in the US, there are regional events to consider too! WUSS (Western Users of SAS Software) and SESUG (Southeast SAS Users Group) are both recruiting for content. And we are okay with you submitting the same idea/proposal for multiple conferences: we're all friends here!

Submit your proposals today!

Obviously, we want your content ideas and your attendance for SAS Explore. But what's in it for you (aside from the glory and fame of appearing on the agenda)? Accepted presenters will earn free registration for the event! (You'll still need to get yourself to Las Vegas to present.)

Submit your content proposal here.

Call for content is open until May 31.

Reminder: we are also inviting SAS customers to nominate themselves for SAS Customer Recognition awards! There are several categories to consider, and first-place winners will earn free attendance to SAS Explore 2023 (including registration and travel allowance). See the SAS Customer Recognition Awards site for all of the details.