Registration Open for 2026 Wyoming Computing Symposium at UW Oct. 19-23

Registration is open for the 2026 Wyoming Computing Symposium, “Computing in the WYLD: Navigating Wyoming’s Natural and Digital Wilderness,” Monday-Friday, Oct. 19-23, at the University of Wyoming’s Wyoming Union.

Students, faculty, researchers, industry professionals, government representatives and community members are invited to attend five days of talks, hands-on workshops and opportunities to connect across disciplines. To register, go here.

The symposium will explore how computing, data science and artificial intelligence (AI) can help address challenges that matter to Wyoming, from cybersecurity and wildlife health to agriculture, rural communities and environmental resilience. The symposium is hosted by UW’s School of Computing and an interdisciplinary organizing committee with members from across campus, regional universities, industry and national labs.

“Some of the most useful ideas emerge when people who know a problem deeply work alongside people who build computing tools,” says Junhua Ding, dean of the School of Computing. “The symposium creates space for those conversations while giving participants practical ways to learn new skills and find collaborators.” 

The schedule is as follows:

Monday, Oct. 19 -- The week opens with a focus on cybersecurity, privacy, digital infrastructure and emerging threats. Scheduled speakers represent the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, Cyber Wyoming, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, the state of Wyoming and Zendus Group.

Tuesday, Oct. 20 -- Sessions on finding and using data, a poster session, a computing resource fair and introductory workshops are scheduled.

Wednesday, Oct. 21 -- “Computing for Wildlife and Agriculture” explores how AI and data science advance wildlife monitoring, disease detection and environmental surveillance. The discussion will feature experts from AddaxAI, Western Ecosystems Technology (WEST), leading universities, and UW’s WyoPATH and WyldTech programs.

Thursday, Oct. 22 -- “Smart Rural Places & Environmental Resilience,” organized in partnership with the National Science Foundation ASCEND Engine, examines computing applications for rural communities, environmental monitoring and smoke forecasting. Contributors are from MNVR, Argonne National Laboratory, the National Ecological Observatory Network, Colorado State University and UW’s WyGISC.

Wednesday and Thursday events connect domain specialists with computing experts to share research, explore practical applications and build collaborations.

Friday, Oct. 23 -- The symposium concludes with hands-on advanced technical workshops. 

Students and researchers can use the symposium to build skills they can apply to their own work. Training includes introductory and intermediate Python with UW Libraries; research computing on UW’s Advanced Research Computing Center systems; and data visualization and neural network sessions led by Argonne National Laboratory specialists. UW Information Technology also will share ways to navigate institutional data and reporting. 

When registering, participants should add a general admission ticket for symposium programming, then select any lunch tickets and workshop tickets they want. Workshop seats are limited, so early registration is encouraged.

For a full schedule and speaker lineup, go here.

Symposium sponsors are Idaho National Laboratory, McDonald Data Sciences, MNVR, WEST and the U.S. Census Bureau.

For more information, email the UW School of Computing at uwyo-soc@uwyo.edu.