Dear NWERC stakeholders and other interested parties,

For the past few months we - the NWERC 2020 organizers - have been holding down our breaths, hoping to see the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic in recession before our planned contest date in November. Following a second wave of the pandemic in Iceland, rules enforced for the foreseeable future about quarantine of arriving passengers has made it impossible for us to commit to an onsite contest with any meaningful time in advance. It is for this reason that we see ourselves forced to bring you the sad, but perhaps expected news that the 2020 edition of NWERC will not be hosted onsite at Reykjavík University.

The ICPC has given regionals leeway to hold their contests any time before the end of March 2021. SWERC has decided to hold their contest online, with a local site in every country. For NWERC 2020 we propose a similar arrangement, with the possibility of more than one site in each country. We also propose postponing the contest until January, February or March of next year to

• make room for additional planning and organization,
• in hope Covid-related restrictions will be loosened in the meantime, and
• give subregionals freedom to adjust their contest dates for the same reasons.

We ask for support from all participating countries, and are actively looking for volunteers to help make NWERC 2020 become a reality, despite the strange circumstances. If you think you or someone you know might be able to help, even if it's just to be a point of contact for your university or country, please reply to this email or get in touch at contact@nwerc.eu.

We hope to resolve the many open logistical questions with the help of these points of contacts, taking into account any constraints that the different countries may have. Cross-site requirements will be kept at a minimum to make it as easy as possible to organize a local site. In particular, the usual extracurricular activities will be replaced with a livestream containing an entertaining and interesting Tech talk. We believe that a modest event with focus on the contest itself is appropriate this year due to the circumstances, and hope we can resume our normal program with an onsite NWERC 2021 in November of next year, at Reykjavík University in Iceland.

To end this email on a positive note, we are happy to announce that this year the NWERC family has gotten bigger. Please give a warm welcome to Lithuania, who recently became a participating country of NWERC and NCPC!

Please don't hesitate to reach out to contact@nwerc.eu with any questions, comments or concerns, and we really hope to hear from as many potential points of contacts as possible. If you know of anyone that may not have received a copy of this email but should, please do forward it.

Best regards and well wishes during these challenging times,
The NWERC 2020 organizers

Unnar Freyr Erlendsson
Contest director

Bjarki Ágúst Guðmundsson
Technical director