Venue, Accommodation, Visas, Registration Info

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Timeline

CompEd will be held in Chengdu, China on May 17-19, 2019. Below is a timeline for the conference and all related activities. CompEd will co-locate with the ACM Turing Celebration Conference – China (ACM TURC 2019), which will take place 18-19 May. TURC conferences attract over 2,000 attendees, and they feature well-known keynote speakers (including several Turing Award winners) and include several federated subconferences. CompEd will also function in conjunction with Computing Curricula 2020 project meetings. The CompEd program will incorporate some TURC keynotes, sessions, and banquet.

Monday May 13: Working Groups information session (evening)
Tuesday May 14: Working Groups in session (all day)
Wednesday May 15: Working Groups in session (all day)
Thursday May 16: Working Groups in session (morning); Optional conference excursion (afternoon)
Friday May 17: CompEd day 1 (all day); Dinner (evening)
Saturday May 18: CompEd day 2 (all day); Banquet (evening) *
Sunday May 19: CompEd day 3 (all day) *

*Note that for Saturday and Sunday, the CompEd program will provide for CompEd attendees to participate in TURC keynotes without missing any CompEd sessions.

The draft conference program is available here.

Venue & Accommodation

Important note on Accommodation. In general all foreigners visiting China must register their place of accommodation with local authorities within 24 hours of arriving in China. This is a separate requirement to the visa required to enter the country.

If you are staying in a hotel the hotel staff will take your passport, and possibly photocopy it when you check in. They will complete the registration for you.
If you are staying with friends or in private accommodation such as an AirBnB accommodation you need to register at the local police station. This requires the cooperation of your host or friend. If you plan to stay in an AirBnB-style accommodation, ensure that the host is willing to do this with you within 24 hours of arriving.
If you change where you stay (for instance travel to another city) you need to re-register there. Again, if you are in a hotel this is done automatically when you check in. For more information, you can start here: https://lawandborder.com/temporary-residence-registration-for-foreign-nationals/

CompEd will be held at the Chengdu Cynn Xanadu Hotel, No.69 North Kehua Road , Wuhou, 610065 Chengdu, China:

- http://cynn.hotels-of-chengdu.com/en/
- booking.com link

Rooms can also be booked on hotels.com, and other travel sites
Approx $160 per night as of Jan 15 2019. The conference hotel is likely now fully booked but some of the hotels below may have availability.
Chengdu Shuangliu International Airport is a 30 minute drive
The hotel is walking distance to the Moziqiao Metro Station on line 3. Many of the hotels below are also near metro stations.

The following hotels are near the conference venue:

Ascott Raffles City Chengdu, No.3 Section 4, South Renmin Road, Wuhou District, Wuhou, 610041 Chengdu, China
- booking.com link
- 20 minute walk (7 minute taxi) from conference venue
- approx $100/night as of Jan 15 2019
Harriway Hotel, No.12 Hongxing Road 3rd Section, Jinjiang, 610016 Chengdu, China
- booking.com link
- 30 minute walk (15 minute taxi) from conference venue
- approx $100/night as of Jan 15 2019
Sofitel Chengdu Taihe, 15 Binjiang Middle Road, Jinjiang, 610016 Chengdu, China
- booking.com link
- 30 minute walk (9 minute taxi) from conference venue
- approx $75/night as of Jan 15 2019
- near metro line
Renaissance Chengdu, No.48, Section 4, South Renmin Road, Wuhou, 610041 Chengdu, China
- booking.com link
- 33 minute walk (11 minute taxi) from conference venue
- approx $125/night as of Jan 15 2019
Grand Hyatt Chengdu, No.8 Chunxi Rd Nan Duan, Jinjiang, 610021 Chengdu, China
- booking.com link
- 35 minute walk (9 minute taxi) from conference venue
- approx $160/night as of Jan 15 2019
JW Marriott Chengdu, No.19 Dongyu Street, Jinjiang, 610020 Chengdu, China
- booking.com link
- 40 minute walk (14 minute taxi) from conference venue
- approx $160/night as of Jan 15 2019

Visas

You will need to get a Visa from a Chinese Embassy to travel to China. If you are not near one, you can use a visa service. There is a fee for that, but they will help you fill out the forms and tell you what you need. You will then mail your passport to them, they will get the visa and mail you your passport back. Generally you need to provide plane tickets, accommodation information, and a letter (information on this below) to apply for a visa. The Chinese Embassy or visa service will have more information. Here are some services we know people have used in the past to obtain a Visa to China from the U.S.:

http://www.visaexpress.net/
http://www.washingtonexpressvisas.com
http://mastervisaservice.com/
http://www.travisa.com

You will need an invitation letter from the local committee in China. We have been told by visa services a letter from ACM is not sufficient. Authors will be sent information on how to get an invitation letter. For others, the visa letter process begins when you complete registration. The registration system will collect the relevant information from you (passport number, date of birth, etc.). Every two days this information is sent to the local committee in China who will then send letters to those that have registered. Please allow 5 business days to receive your visa support letter. Please check your spam folder regularly (we have had reports of letters going into spam), and preferably, whitelist comped2019 at cuit dot edu dot cn.

If you have someone traveling with you who is not attending the conference they will likely need a tourist visa. They will need to show proof that accommodation and a return (round-trip) plane ticket to get a tourist visa.

Info on getting a Visa for those outside the USA: The process may be similar, but we are not familiar with obtaining a visa if you are from another country. We recommend you contact a visa service, or your nearest Chinese embassy or consulate. See our FAQ for a link to find your nearest embassy or consulate.

Registration Information

Registration is now open at the address: http://www.cvent.com/d/s6qjtg/4W

All prices are in US dollars.

	SIGCSE Members	Non-Members	Student
Early (through Apr 22)	$600	$700	$300
Late (Apr 23 – May 13)	$650	$750	$300
Onsite	$700	$800	$300

Registration extras

Excursion to Panda Reservation (details below)	$35
Working Group Member fee (covers WG rooms and lunches, coffee)	$125
Extra Banquet Tickets (details below)	$65

Excursion

There will be an optional excursion to the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding on Thursday afternoon.

Time: 12.30 – Cynn Hotel Lobby. It is approximately a 1 hour bus journey to the Reservation. From 14.00 – 17.00 we will tour the Giant Panda Museum, Butterfly Pavilion, Giant Panda Cub Pavilion, and Giant Panda Nursery Room. We should be back to the hotel around 18.30. More information: http://www.panda.org.cn/english/. Please bring your passports to the excursion.

Dinner

Thanks to our sponsors there will be a Friday night dinner for CompEd attendees on Friday night (May 17) in the Shujiangchun Restaurant (Kehua North Road, left side of CYNN hotel). People can go to there after conference and we plan to begin the dinner at 6:30 pm. We will meet in the hotel lobby at 5:55 pm. On the map below the big circle is the CYNN hotel and the small one is the Shujiangchun Restaurant. Please see Cary Laxer at registration to purchase guest tickets. If you purchased an extra banquet ticket, it is NOT for this dinner, but for the one below (on Saturday).

Banquet

The banquet dinner of TURC, which all CompEd guests are invited to, on Saturday night (May 18) will be held in the Grand Theatre of CYNN (the venue for keynote on Saturday and Sunday), people can begin to get into the theatre at 6:00 and begin the banquet at 7:00 pm. If you purchased an extra banquet ticket this is the event for which that ticket is good.

Ground Transportation

There are two options for getting from the airport in Chengdu to the conference venue or your hotel, and for getting around Chengdu.
Taxi: Here is a card that you can show to the driver to get to the venue. If you are staying at a different hotel it is recommended that you take a photo of the address with your phone, and print out a copy to use. The cost of a taxi from the airport to the venue is approximately 50 RMB (about 7 USD). It is recommended that you use a public, signed, metered taxi. It is recommended that you have local currency on you. This can be obtained before you travel at some foreign exchange services, or at the airport.
Subway: Generally Chinese subways are easy for foreigners to navigate and are recommended. Chengdu has an extensive subway network. For a map of the route from the airport to the venue see here. For a route overview see here. The hotel is walking distance to the Moziqiao Metro Station on line 3.

Other Local Information (food, sightseeing, internet, money)

Getting local currency, updated May 16 (see bottom of page)
Recommended restaurants near the conference are here.
As many attendees are coming a long distance they may want to do some sightseeing. The local committee has put together a list of optional tours (open to the public) here.
Internet access: The conference venue will provide free wifi. However some services will not be available. This includes Google services including Gmail. If your institutions’s email is provided by Gmail you will have to take steps to receive email. For instance you could have emails forwarded to another service such as Hotmail. It is suggested that you look into renting a pocket wifi router at the airport. Many of these may allow access as you are used to at home. Also, if your home mobile provider allows roaming in China, you should experience normal service. Should you have questions, please contact comped2019 at cuit dot edu dot cn.
US and foreign credit cards: These can be used at some places, typically hotels and some larger restaurants. However, they are not widely accepted. It is recommended that you contact your bank to put a travel notification on your account.
US and foreign debit cards: Generally these can be used in China. There are many Chinese banks (and come foreign/international banks such as HSBC). If your card does not work at a particular ATM, it does not necessarily indicate something wrong with your account. It is recommended that you try a number of different ATMs from different banks. It is highly recommended that you contact your bank to put a travel notification on your account.
Apple Pay is accepted at some vendors. If you have a WeChat account with pay enabled, this is accepted almost everywhere including even street vendors. Many people in China live without using cash and can pay for everything they need with WeChat.
Getting local currency. The cash machine in the Cynn hotel does not seem to work with foreign cards. Today we tested the two banks nearest the Cynn hotel and had no luck there either. We found a Bank of China about an 8 minute walk from the hotel that worked for 5 foreign cards from Ireland, NZ, & USA. Here are instructions and photos on getting there. (There is a second Bank of China we found afterwards – directions to that one after the following).
1. Walk out of the Cynn hotel to the main road. This road runs north (right) – south (left). Look across the road, slightly to the right (north). There is a smaller road there (Mozi St.) that runs west, away from the hotel and the main road (perpendicular to the main road).
2. Look more to the the right (north) and there is a foot bridge – use that to get to the other (west) side of the main road, which will bring you to Mozi St (which you were looking towards from the hotel side).
3. Continue down Mozi St. going west (away from hotel and main road). In 3 to 4 minutes you’ll get to a noticeable stainless steel barrier to keep scooters from passing through. Go through barrier and continue straight. There will now be trees lining the street. Soon, the bank of China is on the right-hand side. There are several ATMs in the far side of the entrance. These are open later than the main bank (possibly 24 hours).
4. Map and photos below:

Route from Cynn hotel to Bank of China. ~8 min walk

The second bank of China we found is on the main road that the hotel is on, again about 7 or 8 minutes away. Walk out of the Cynn hotel and turn left (south) on the main road. Take the second pedestrian bridge to cross road. The Bank of China is very near you when you return to street level on the other side.