Lessons from Attending My First Big Conference
Whew, I am exhausted.
This week, I was lucky enough to be able to attend a few days of the Ecological Society of America’s Annual Conference in Baltimore (Check out #ESA100 on Twitter!). My awesome supervisor at NWF was nice enough to grant me a couple days to attend, in part because there was research being presented that was highly relevant to our work. This was my first scientific conference, and I wanted to share my experience and the lessons I learned here for anyone else considering attending a conference. Now that I’ve had this experience, I feel much more prepared for the next big conference, and there are things I know I will do different next time around.
First of all, Conferences are expensive. Is it really worth it?
Holy balls, are cons expensive. This is particularly annoying because any advice you hear about being an early-career/student scientist probably includes going to as many conferences as possible. But you are probably young and broke AF.
I feel you. The advise is good: Cons are a great opportunity to see what’s happening on the forefront of your field and are a great opportunity to meet researchers of interest, because you can just walk right up to them and introduce yourself, and you’re not going to get ignored (unlike your email to them, which is sitting in their inbox along with 100 other identical emails). But are these opportunities really worth the investment? That depends a lot on your financial situation and your goals. Here is my advice for deciding.
Figure out your Real Cost: i.e. the cheapest way you can attend including transport and housing. The ticket price you see is not accurate. You can probably attend for cheaper, but don’t forget to consider transportation and housing in your budget. Knowing how much it’s ACTUALLY going to cost you is the first step for deciding whether to go or not. Don’t give up till you’ve explored all your options, and budget carefully.
There are almost always student rates. There are also member discounts. If you’re not a member of the society putting on the con, consider becoming one. Sometimes the discount on the con price for members is larger than the membership fee itself.
Consider just attending a few select days. There are usually day tickets for far cheaper, and attending one or two days might be better than not attending at all.
Talk to your school and/or employer. Your school might be able to offset the cost of attending the con, or be able to connect you with a professor or another student who is attending with whom you might be able to cost-share. Your employer might consider attending the conference “professional development” and allow you paid time off to attend, or maybe even offset your cost of attendance. You never know until you ask, and the worst they can say is no. I expected a big fat no, full stop, from my employer because I was brand-spanking new there. I’ve only been in my job for 1 week before this conference and why would they allow me time off when I’m that new? But I asked anyway. I researched what was going on at the conference, presented the opportunity to gather relevant knowledge to our work, offered to represent the organization there, and they said yes!!
Try contacting the conference itself and explaining your situation. Many cons have sponsorship attendee tickets which they may or may not advertise. These are held in reserve for people just like you who would benefit from attending but who can’t afford it.
Consider alternative housing options. The con is probably associated with a hotel and a “special rate” for rooms there during the con. But it’s still likely to be expensive. Consider sharing rooms with a colleague or a rando – ESA had a public forum for people to find roommates. Think whether you know anyone who lives in that city (I stayed with Charise’s mom, whom I’d never met before, haha). And definitely check out AirBnB.Put all this together to understand your real cost.
Understand your goals. Define for yourself what you’re hoping to get out of this experience. If your goals can only be achieved by attending this conference, that is a very strong reason to shoulder the financial cost. Knowing specific goals going in will help you achieve those, and therefore feel like your money was well-spent when it’s over. Are there specific people you want to meet in person? Are they planning on being in attendance? That’s a great reason. Are you trying to get a good understanding of where your field is headed? This is a great opportunity for that. Are you trying to sample a lot of different sub-disciplines to figure out where your interest lie? That’s another strong reason to go.
BUY EARLY. The earlier you buy your ticket, reserve your housing, and buy your bus/train/plane ticket the cheaper it will all be. This is related to #1
Cons are great. Go if you can; I think they’re generally worth it. But remember that every discipline and every society has their own. There are also regional ones that happen between the big annual conferences that are generally cheaper and probably closer to you (unless you’re one of those fuckers who live in Cali, where everything is held). If you can’t go this year, just start saving for the next one. It’s no big deal.
Ok, I’m going. What should I wear?
Whatever you want! No, really!! Now, take this with a small grain of salt, because it may be that cons in other fields are different, but I know at least MOST cons are pretty casual. Maybe not, like, a medical conference; for some reason I imagine their cons to be more formal. But yeah for the natural sciences – relax. I saw all different levels of dress, and literally no one cared. Some people wore sandals, shorts, and a baggy t-shirt; others suits and ties. This was even true for presenters. Some were dressed in straight business attire, while others wore a button-up (but not tucked in!) shirt with casual pants. To be honest, the more casually-dressed presenters also tended to speak the most conversationally, which made their presentations more dynamic and interesting as compared to the formalized speech of the fancier-dressed.
How do I talk to people?? They’re so cool, and I’m so insignificant.
WHEN I SEE MY FAVORITE BIG WIG AT THE CONFERENCE
Source:WhatShouldWeCallGradSchool.tumblr.com
Once again, I feel you, hypothetical-reader. But let me tell you: Presenters expect this. It’s common practice for people to approach a speaker after their presentation and ask them questions or chat about their work. It’s also totally common for students to approach principal researchers to start a conversation about coming to their lab. My two pieces of advice are this: Have a networking card or something of the like to give them (and others) with your name, contact info, and discipline or current educational status/job position on it. But mostly, just prepare a little elevator speech beforehand so you don’t get flustered and don’t waste their time (or feel like you’re wasting their time, actually). My example: “Hi, I’m Nicole! [shake their hand] I’m a student interested in climate change and other disturbance affects on the landscape level, and I really enjoyed your talk.” [If there is a particular point they made that made you go “Ahaaa!” or a question that you have, mention it now.] Then, “Well, I will let you go, but is it ok for me to email you with some more questions/so we can talk about this more? Thanks!” [Give card/get card.]
Easy-peasy, lemon squeezy. You’re in, you’re out, you’re done. Interaction success.
What other advice do you have?
Ok listen up – this is my biggest lesson: PACE. YOURSELF. If you’re like me, you don’t yet have a super-specific sub-area of interest. If you’re at the con to hear about, like, this one type of bacteria and how it relates to the Phosphorus Cycle in tundra ecosystems in the Eastern hemisphere on Tuesdays when the moon is full, your schedule is gonna be pretty straight forward. Otherwise, there might be many different talks that catch your interest. These con schedules are pretty packed – there were about 4500 talks offered this week, about 40 going on concurrently every 20 minutes at the ESA conference. Plus there are constantly poster sessions up to browse, optional field-trips, and evening workshops. YOU CAN’T DO IT ALL. TRUST ME. I exhausted myself by trying to pack in every little thing, determined as I was to get my money’s worth out of this conference. The result: I was too physically and mentally tired to fully absorb everything that was being presented to me, and ended up enjoying myself less. And I was only here 2 days! The conference lasted a week! Here are my rules to avoid this:
Plan ahead. The minute you get the full schedule, sit down with that thing, make yourself a time table, and identify your “CANNOT MISS” events. Then, fill in some “Would like to attend” events around these, but don’t pack your schedule. Leave some time for decompression and reflection; getting food (VERY important); and maybe even a nap!
Don’t stress. If you miss a talk, that paper WILL come out sometime later and you can just read it then. You have the names and institutions of everyone presenting in your schedule packet. Just email them later, if you want.
Take care of yourself. This bears repeating: Get enough sleep. Get enough food.
Finally, cons of all sort are always more fun with friends who share your interests. Bring a nerd-buddy, and have fun :)
