TaCoS
The Conference of Computational Linguistics Students—the acronym makes sense in German—is a conference entirely organised by student volunteers, focusing on computational linguistics, language technology, computational humanities, artificial intelligence, and natural language processing. It was first held in 1992 and has since taken place once a year at a (usually) German-speaking university. Usually, there is a plethora of English language talks available, though, so don’t be afraid to attend, even if you don’t speak German.
Students (so maybe you, too) present their work there in the form of talks and interactive workshops. The format is very open: for example, many people present a seminar project that went well (or particularly poorly), a thesis, current research, or other computer linguistics-related pet projects. In addition, established researchers from the host university are usually invited as keynote speakers.
There is usually a rich social program where you can meet students from all over Germany, exchange ideas, explore a new city, and have fun.
Heidelberg has also hosted TaCoS several times, including in 2016, almost in 2020, and in 2026. If you’re wondering how it works (or if you need to organize another student conference), there’s a guide. And if you’d like to host a TaCoS in Heidelberg again, bring it up at a student council meeting.