Scientific meetings are important to the development of early career ocean scientists, yet little documentation exists regarding how meeting planners can develop activities that will be most useful to this group. Based upon the authors’ experience gained through activities of the Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research and the World Climate Research Programme, as well as ideas offered by colleagues from other organizations, meeting organizers should take the following steps in planning early career activities: (1) form a subcommittee that will plan early career activities and include an early career scientist on it, (2) seek outside financial support for early career activities and for early career scientist travel support, (3) determine the criteria participants must meet to secure travel support, (4) design a registration form to collect information useful for designing activities for early career scientists, (5) plan oral and poster sessions with a variety of opportunities for early career scientists, (6) consider which social media will be best for communicating with early career meeting participants, (7) set aside a “career lounge” at the meeting, and (8) conduct a post-meeting survey. It is important to plan and announce all early career events and opportunities well before the meeting.

Urban, E.R. Jr., and R. Boscolo. 2013. Using scientific meetings to enhance the development of early career scientists. Oceanography 26(2):164–170, https://doi.org/10.5670/oceanog.2013.16.

Cuker, B.E. 2006. Programmatic approaches to building diversity in the aquatic sciences. Marine Technology Society Journal 39:13–16, https://doi.org/10.4031/002533205787465869.
1. Glessmer, M.S., Y.V. Wang, and R. Kontak. 2012. Networking as a tool for Earth science women to build community and succeed. Eos, Transactions, American Geophysical Union 43(41):406, https://doi.org/10.1029/2012EO410011.
2. Jagodic, M., P. Stridh, A.K.B. Gad, A. Paine, K.I. Udekwe, L.K. Sjöholm, M. Svensson, and Q. Pan-Hammarström. 2013. Nurture your scientific curiosity early in your research career. Nature Genetics 45(2):116–118, https://doi.org/10.1038/ng.2527.
3. Tilmes, S., A. MonaGhan, and J. Done. 2012. Addressing climate challenges in developing countries. Eos, Transactions, American Geophysical Union 93(14):145, https://doi.org/10.1029/2012EO140008.
4. Weiler, C.S. 2007. Meeting PhD graduates’ needs in a changing global environment. Eos, Transactions, American Geophysical Union 88(13):149–151, https://doi.org/10.1029/2007EO130002.
5. Wendler, C., B. Bridgeman, R. Markle, F. Cline, N. Bell, P. McAllister, and J. Kent. 2012. Pathways Through Graduate School and Into Careers. Educational Testing Service and Council of Graduate Schools. Available at http://pathwaysreport.org.

This is an open access article made available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution, and reproduction in any medium or format as long as users cite the materials appropriately, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate the changes that were made to the original content. Images, animations, videos, or other third-party material used in articles are included in the Creative Commons license unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If the material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission directly from the license holder to reproduce the material.