How the MCCS Organized a Brillant Symposium for their Member Researchers from Around the World
MCCS used Fourwaves to help bring together top researchers and budding scientists from around the world.
International Scientific Society
Symposium with poster session and oral presentations
Organizing a scientific convention is no small feat. From juggling complex registration to ensuring hassle-free badge generation, the logistical demands can be challenging. In addition to this, there is the need to create a professional event website, accurately track payments, and manage last-minute changes on site—and the task becomes even more daunting.
For the Molecular & Cellular Cognition Society (MCCS), adopting Fourwaves transformed the organizers’ annual symposium from an operational hurdle into a persuasive success story.
Fourwaves truly felt like a one-stop shop for everything we needed. It made attracting people and organizing our event more efficient than we could have imagined.
Distinguished Professor, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee
The MCCS’s Annual Symposium
Each year, the MCCS hosts forums and symposia featuring poster sessions, talks and networking opportunities. The latest gathering was the 2024 Annual Symposium, which was held in Chicago in October 2024, organized by President, Dr. Karyn M. Frick of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, who is a Distinguished Professor, Neuroscience Area Chair, and Neuroscience Major Director as well as Co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer of Estrigenix Therapeutics.
Dr. Frick’s vision for the 2024 Symposium was clear: to bring together top researchers and budding scientists from around the world for an unforgettable poster session, evening reception and complete day of groundbreaking talks for open collaboration and discovery.
The challenge: Event management bogged down by legacy processes
Planning and managing a high-profile scientific event like the MCCS Symposium requires a level of meticulous coordination between many stakeholders. However, relying on manual workflows, along with limited and inflexible event management software, can quickly turn a conference’s organization into a logistical nightmare.
Dr. Frick was determined to find event management software that could cater to her and her team’s many event management needs, including:
Efficient Registration Management
- A system to handle early and late registrations with minimal manual intervention
- A solution for managing payments digitally to eliminate inefficiencies and credit card handling at the entrance
Customizable Badge Generation
- Resources for seamless badge customization, including effortlessly adding additional lines or specific details
- Integration with existing printing solutions for quick badge production with Avery templates
User-friendly Website Design
- A product for creating a visually appealing and intuitive event website
- Features that allow administrators to test, view, and adjust the registration process from the attendee’s perspective
Flexible Schedule and Document Management
- Options to design and print schedules with customizable templates (e.g., PDFs or Word files)
- The ability to include additional descriptions and event information as needed
Robust Financial Tracking
- Comprehensive tools to monitor payments, refunds, and overall finances.
- Transparent reporting to assist with catering and other important decisions that could impact the event’s budget as well as analytics for profitability assessment
Fourwaves: A game changer for the MCCS Symposium
After evaluating several event management platforms for academic summits and congresses, Dr. Frick decided to use Fourwaves, following recommendations from peers.
We wanted a platform that would reflect the high standards of our organization. Fourwaves’ sophisticated software made it an obvious choice.
Distinguished Professor, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee
She and her team were impressed with many of the Fourwave’s features and advantages:
- User-friendliness, with minimal training needed
- Document and badge customization capabilities
- Fast and accessible functionalities to design a sleek, responsive and compelling event website and conference program
- Secure event registration and payment processing, with no manual intervention from staff
- QR codes for last-minute registrations on site
- Easy-to-understand dashboards to quickly view registrations, payment statuses, financial details and refunds
Elevating the event experience with efficiency and insights
Using Fourwaves, the MCCS team took full control of their website, eliminating the costs and extended timelines of hiring external designers and consultants.
The system enabled the team to create a functional site tailored to the event’s needs. With the ability to make real-time updates, the organization kept the website accurate and adaptable throughout the process—without breaking the bank.
The hours saved were just as effective. The team reclaimed valuable time to focus on the attendee, speaker and sponsorship experience by automating tasks like registration, badge creation, and financial tracking. Freed from the burden of tedious tasks, they fine-tuned the program, collaborated with speakers, and facilitated that every detail of the event was aligned with operational goals.
Real-time financial insights added another layer of control. Staff could track the numbers in a way that allowed them to act proactively—whether for modifying last-minute changes or updating amenity orders for the summit.
Future plans with Fourwaves and the MCCS
The success of the 2024 MCCS Symposium demonstrated the transformative power of implementing a more contemporary event management solution like Fourwaves.
By centralizing operations, cutting costs, giving the team time to prioritize creating a one-of-a-kind attendee experience, Fourwaves has set a new benchmark for academic convention planning.
For MCCS, Fourwaves isn’t only software. It is essential in fostering global connections and highlighting the pioneering progress of the society’s members. Dr. Frick and her team look forward to continuing their partnership with Fourwaves to shape the future of their events so that each one builds on the success of the last.
About the MCCS
Founded in 2002, the MCCS is an international organization dedicated to advancing interdisciplinary research at the crossroads of molecular, cellular, and behavioural neuroscience.
With over 4,000 members, the MCCS operates worldwide, with regional branches, such as MCCS-Asia and the European Molecular and Cellular Cognition Society (EMCCS).