Welcome to the GPN & ARE-ON Joint Conference 2026 schedule. Use this page to browse sessions, view speaker and session details, and build your personal agenda for June 22–24 in Rogers, Arkansas. Check back through May as additional sessions and details are added.
Log in to add sessions to your schedule and sync them to your phone or calendar.
Welcome to the participants for GPN's afternoon of organizational meetings, along with workshops for both GPN and ARE-ON members. Two of the committees are meeting concurrently with workshop activities, so they are open to all conference participants but please get your tickets at: https://gpnandareonjointconference2026.eventbrite.com/. The welcome will highlight GPN's actions and accomplishments of 2025/6 and what's coming soon.
Recently joined GPN after working on NTIA, HUD, and HRSA grants in Texas. Now constructing a home near UAMS, UALR, and Philander Smith University in Little Rock.
The GPN CIP Team initiates the program area ideas behind GPN, while facilitating their completion. Topics will include:
The GPN High Performance Computing infrastructure, including survey distribution and findings, NRP/OSG involvement, and the latest on the OAK SuperComputing Consortium. Contributors will include the GP-STOR NSF Project Team, NRP PI Frank Wuerthwein, and OAK project PI, Christopher Fennell.
State plans for A.I. activities and grant submissions.
Quantum projects within GPN
Emerging Institution activities
Priorities for 2027
Participation is open but voting is limited to committee members.
As the CIO of the Missouri System, Ben Canlas is also serving as the Chair of the GPN Executive Committee, heading the leadership and decision making team for the Consortium.
Meeting for 30 min and then a Security Table Top Exercise: CMMC NIST 800-171
Max Attendee Tickets Available:20 *IMPORTANT REGISTRATION INFORMATION Attendees must first complete their Joint Conference registration prior to attending this workshop. In addition, pre-registration for this workshop session is required at: https://gpnandareonjointconference2026.eventbrite.com/
Institutions of higher education are frequently targeted by malicious cyber actors. Adversaries seek persistent access to vital systems and aim to disrupt essential operations and services.
CISA Cybersecurity State Coordinator H. Gayle Combs will conduct a tabletop exercise to examine preparedness for a significant cyber incident. The simulated attack will address the ability to detect, contain and restore services. The analysis will explore impact, response plans, and measures for continuous operations. Discussion will incorporate strategies to satisfy incident response compliance requirements for handling Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI) - consistent with the Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) and NIST SP 800-171 protocols.
Collaboratively, Supervisory Protective Security Advisor Glenn Moore will touch upon effects of cyber-attacks on physical security, to include CISA resources to enhance campus physical security.
GPN Network Technical Advisory Committee will follow the Science DMZ workshop and go from 2:30 pm - 3:00 pm. Only committee members eligible to cast votes.
Shannon Spurling is a network engineer at the University of Missouri for MOREnet, the research and education network for the state. As the lead engineer, his team designs the network and the routers to support connections to the higher education, K-12, and government facilities for... Read More →
For more than a decade, GPN and the National Research Platform (NRP) have joined forces to assure researchers throughout the Midwest have the access to advance computing resources to conduct research and to teach researching skills. Dr. Frank Wuerthwin is a widely recognized leader in the field, as the director of the San Diego Supercomputing Center and the lead of the OSG network for science. Frank will discuss the emerging role of GPN within the national research infrastructure and share ideas on greater involvement over the next decade. He will be speaking in the Peterson Auditorium
