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<div>
(This article was first published on <strong><a href="http://forwards.github.io/blog/2018/02/05/r-in-latin-america/"> Blog on FORWARDS</a></strong>, and kindly contributed to <a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.r-bloggers.com/">R-bloggers)</a> </div>
<p>Following on from our post on <a rel="nofollow" href="http://forwards.github.io/blog/2017/12/01/r-in-africa/" target="_blank">R in Africa</a> this<br>
next post in the series looks at the R community across Latin America.</p>

<h2>Conferences</h2>
<p>As the use of R has grown in Latin America, there has been an increasing demand<br>
for local R conferences. The community has responded and a number of conferences<br>
are planned for the coming months.</p>
<h3>International Seminar on Statistics with R</h3>
<p>One of the first to spot the demand was Luciane Alcoforado, a professor at the<br>
Fluminense Federal University (UFF) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Realizing there was<br>
no large R event in Brazil, she set about coordinating the first International<br>
Seminar on Statistics with R (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://serrio2016.weebly.com/" target="_blank">SER: Seminário Internacional de Estatística com<br>
R</a>), which was held in Niterói in May 2016.</p>
<p><img alt="" src="https://i0.wp.com/forwards.github.io/images/blog/r-in-latin-america/Alcoforado2_ISER.png?w=456" data-recalc-dims="1"><br>
<em><br>Luciane Alcoforado, Coordinator of the first SER</em></p>
<p>More than 250 people attended this pioneering event, with attendance balanced<br>
across academia and industry. Encouraged by this success, the I SER organizers<br>
ran the event again in 2017, with an expanded program and similar numbers<br>
attending.</p>
<p><img alt="" src="https://i0.wp.com/forwards.github.io/images/blog/r-in-latin-america/Sean_online_SERI_scaled.jpg?w=456" data-recalc-dims="1"><br>
<em><br>Sean Kross presents remotely at the first SER</em></p>
<p>A third edition, <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.ser.uff.br/" target="_blank">III SER</a>, is now planned for<br>
May 22-24, 2018, to be hosted again by UFF in Niterói, Brazil.<br>
On the first day, 8 mini courses will<br>
be run, aimed at both practitioners and students. This year most of the<br>
international guests come from the USA and England. They include<br>
Jesse Mostipak, Becky Pattinson, Garreth Maccray, and Gabriela de Queiroz.<br>
These guests will present alongside invited speakers from the local region. There<br>
will also be thirty selected contributed talks and a poster session with<br>
awards for the best three of each. It’s a huge opportunity to get your research<br>
known. The last conference day will close<br>
with a tribute session to Prof. Djalma Pessoa who was a pioneer R user<br>
in Brazil.</p>
<p>Registration to III SER and the mini-courses is open now and the call for papers<br>
is open until March 23 2018.</p>
<h3>R Day</h3>
<p>A second event in Brazil, R Day, will take place at the Federal University of<br>
Paraná (UFPR), Curitiba, on May 22, 2018. The Statistics Department at UFPR was one<br>
of the first in Brazil to adopt R as the standard programming language<br>
for statistics teaching, in 2002. It was also the first institution<br>
to host a <a rel="nofollow" href="http://cran-r.c3sl.ufpr.br/" target="_blank">CRAN mirror</a> in the country, and started<br>
the <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.leg.ufpr.br/doku.php/software:rbr" target="_blank">R-br mailing<br>
list</a> in 2011, which now has<br>
more than 1000 subscribers.</p>
<p>The R Day is organized as a satellite event of the <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rbras.org.br/rbras63/" target="_blank">63rd RBRAS<br>
meeting</a> (Brazilian Region of the<br>
International Biometric Society), and is endorsed by the R Foundation to further<br>
develop the academic R community in Brazil. There will be three keynotes, 9 oral<br>
presentations, and 8 tutorials, aimed at both users and developers. The<br>
main goal is to be community-driven, so anyone can<br>
submit proposals for oral presentations and/or tutorials (only the three<br>
keynote speakers will be invited by the organizers).</p>
<p>The aim of R Day is to gather the vast R community in Brazil, by<br>
offering the possibility for users and developers to show their work and<br>
exchange experience on all sorts of R subjects. Proposals for oral<br>
presentations and tutorials are open until April 04. The registration is<br>
free and can be made until April 22.</p>
<p>For more information and updates, registration and proposal forms,<br>
checkout the <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rday.leg.ufpr.br/" target="_blank">R Day website</a>, and follow us on<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.facebook.com/leg.ufpr/" target="_blank">Facebook</a> and<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="https://twitter.com/LEG_UFPR" target="_blank">Twitter</a>.</p>
<p><img alt="" src="https://i0.wp.com/forwards.github.io/images/blog/r-in-latin-america/r-day.png?w=456" data-recalc-dims="1"><br>
<em><br>R Day logo (left), Curitiba Botanical Garden (top right), and UFPR<br>
historical building (bottom right)</em></p>
<h3>satRday Bogota</h3>
<p>The first Latin American chapter of the one day conference series satRdays will<br>
take place in Bogota, Colombia in August 2018. The focus of the conference will<br>
be about tidy concepts applied to data visualization. It is organized by<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="http://datasketch.co/" target="_blank">Datasketch</a>, a Data Journalism Portal for Latin America.</p>
<p>The main goal of the conference is to create a common space for interaction<br>
among newbies and experts in R. Special interest will be given to works created<br>
by or for underrepresented communities and to showcase different solutions<br>
developed using R for the different elections that are happening in 2018 in<br>
different Latin American countries.</p>
<p>There are tentative plans for a workshop session the day before with hands-on<br>
tutorials about:</p>
<ul>
<li>Data visualization and common mistakes.</li>
<li>Data structuring and preparation: PDFs, Databases and API’s.</li>
</ul>
<p>A website containing more details will be available soon.</p>
<h3>LatinR</h3>
<p>On October 25, 2017, an announcement was made by Heather Turner on the RUG<br>
Organizers Slack: the R Foundation Conference Committee would like to see<br>
academic-focused R events in regions not currently covered by useR! In less than<br>
a week, a group of Latam R-Ladies were organizing their first conference-call to<br>
start thinking about how this challenge could be achieved. This quick response<br>
was not the result of mere chance, but the consequence of a year in which the R<br>
community — both RUG and R-Ladies groups — grew stronger in South America. By<br>
mid November everything was set-up: a name, a place, a date, and a motivated<br>
international organizing committee.</p>
<p>LatinR 2018 will be held in Buenos Aires on September 4-5 within the 47th<br>
Argentinian Meeting of Informatics and Operational Research (JAIIO), which is<br>
organized by The Argentinian Informatics Society (SADIO). With a diverse and<br>
renowned Scientific Committee, this two-day event aims to bring together<br>
researchers, students, and R-enthusiasts from different backgrounds in order to<br>
strengthen the R community and make the impact that R is having in the region<br>
more visible, in both academic and non academic contexts.</p>
<p>For more information about oral presentations &amp; poster submission, keynotes, and<br>
workshops, you can check out the <a rel="nofollow" href="http://latin-r.com/en" target="_blank">LatinR website</a> or<br>
follow us on Twitter and Facebook: @LatinR2018.</p>
<h3>ConectaR 2019</h3>
<p>In 2019, it is Costa Rica’s turn: <a rel="nofollow" href="http://forwards.github.io/blog/2018/02/05/r-in-latin-america/www.conectar2019.org" target="_blank">ConectaR 2019</a> will<br>
take place in San José. The event has the endorsement of R Foundation and will<br>
be hosted at the <a rel="nofollow" href="http://forwards.github.io/blog/2018/02/05/r-in-latin-america/www.ucr.ac.cr" target="_blank">University of Costa Rica (UCR)</a>. ConectaR has<br>
an organizing committee comprising members of academia<br>
(<a rel="nofollow" href="http://forwards.github.io/blog/2018/02/05/r-in-latin-america/www.estadistica.ucr.ac.cr" target="_blank">School of Statistics</a>,<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="http://forwards.github.io/blog/2018/02/05/r-in-latin-america/www.cimpa.ucr.ac.cr" target="_blank">Pure and Applied Mathematics Research Center (CIMPA)</a>),<br>
public research centers (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://forwards.github.io/blog/2018/02/05/r-in-latin-america/www.odd.ucr.ac.cr" target="_blank">The Development Observatory</a>,<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.bioversityinternational.org/" target="_blank">Bioversity International (CGIAR)</a>)<br>
and industry (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://forwards.github.io/blog/2018/02/05/r-in-latin-america/www.ixpantia.com" target="_blank">ixpantia</a>). ConectaR will have two keynote<br>
speakers (yet to be confirmed) and will be receiving proposals for oral<br>
presentations and posters starting April 2018. In addition to that, there will<br>
be tutorials, invited talks, and a job fair. An attendance of over 150 people is<br>
expected, with the goal of building a community of R users in the Central<br>
American Region.</p>
<h2>Other Initiatives</h2>
<h3>R/Bioconductor Latin American Developers’ Workshop</h3>
<p>In recent years, biology has seen a rise in the use of technologies that enable<br>
high-throughput, quantitative, data-rich profiling of cellular states. As a<br>
result, the field faces computational challenges to analyse such data. The<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="http://bioconductor.org/" target="_blank">R/Bioconductor</a> project is an open source, open<br>
development software platform that provides tools to translate complex data sets<br>
into biological knowledge. An R/Bioconductor workshop will be held in<br>
Cuernavaca, Mexico on July 30 – Aug 3, 2018.</p>
<p>The workshop is aimed at students and researchers interested in the analysis of<br>
biological data. We encourage applications from diverse disciplines, including<br>
but not limited to biologists, bioinformaticians, data scientists, software<br>
engineers and programmers. The main goals of the workshop are:</p>
<ol>
<li>Teaching participants the principles of reproducible data science through the<br>
development of R/Bioconductor packages.</li>
<li>Turning bioinformatic software users into bioinformatic software developers.</li>
<li>Fostering the exchange of expertise and establishing multidisciplinary<br>
collaborations.</li>
<li>Creating a community of Latin American scientists committed to the<br>
development of software and computational pipelines for biological data<br>
analysis.</li>
<li>Helping to train bioinformatics instructors that can continue to grow in<br>
their local communities.</li>
</ol>
<p>This workshop is part of a long-term project to create a community of developers<br>
from Latin America. We hope to hold regular meetings in the future (similar to<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="https://bioconductor.org/help/course-materials/2017/BioC2017/" target="_blank">BioC</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="https://bioconductor.github.io/EuroBioc2017/" target="_blank">EuroBioc</a> and<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.abacbs.org/biocasia2016" target="_blank">BioCAsia</a>) where attendees present their<br>
own software contributions.</p>
<p>A website containing more details will be available soon.</p>
<h3>Local groups</h3>
<p>Beyond conferences and workshops, local groups provide a venue for R users to<br>
meet more regularly. Jumping Rivers provide a<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="https://jumpingrivers.github.io/meetingsR/r-user-groups.html#south-america" target="_blank">user group directory</a>,<br>
which also covers R-Ladies groups, however as R-Ladies are expanding rapidly it<br>
is worth checking the<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="https://github.com/rladies/starter-kit/blob/master/Current-Chapters.md" target="_blank">R-Ladies Starter Kit </a><br>
for the latest status.</p>
<p>Recently members of the RUG and R-Ladies groups in Bogota, Columbia collaborated<br>
on a striking intervention about feminicides in Colombia using plots created in<br>
R. Read more on their initiative in<br>
<a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.datasketch.co/en/p/how-we-used-r-to-raise-alarms-about-feminicides-in-colombia" target="_blank">this report</a><br>
(<strong>warning: readers may find the content distressing</strong>). This is an example of<br>
how local groups can work together on wider issues as well as providing<br>
networking and development opportunities for their members.</p>
<h3>Making Connections</h3>
<p>Part of building the community in Latin America is making connections between<br>
disconnected groups. If you think we have missed something, or you would like to<br>
be involved in plans for future events in the region, let us know in the comments<br>
or contact us on <a rel="nofollow" href="mailto:rowforwards@gmail.com" target="_blank">email</a> or <a rel="nofollow" href="https://twitter.com/r_forwards" target="_blank">Twitter</a>.</p>
<p><small>Banner image shows the poster session at I SER.</small></p>
	<p>
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