At my first conference I was one of about 8,000 attendees; at my second, I was one of about 500. The most noticeable difference between the two was the food. At the large conference, the only food I received was at a special networking lunch I signed up for, and paid extra for. At this conference, there was food everywhere.
Each morning there was a continental breakfast. This was not "continental" in the sense of my (cheap) non-conference hotel, which was cereal, bananas, slightly stale muffins, and the opportunity to make Texas-shaped waffles; this was "continental" in the sense of coffee and danishes of plausibly European origins. More coffee would be served at the second session; no snacks, but then it was right before lunch.
Between the two afternoon sessions, tables were laid out featuring yet more coffee (obviously the caterers understood that attendees would be jet-lagged, and likely unused to waking up at 7 a.m. for several days in a row), and delicious fudgy chocolate brownies. There was an alternative to the brownies, but I ignored it.
The greatest surprise was at the poster session. These were over the dinner hour, and I expected people to be rushing through on their way to nourishment. Instead, there was an array of hors d'oeuvres, including mini kebobs, some little potato pancakes, and many triangular pieces of bread decorated with fancy flowers of butter.
Of course, there was more to the conference than just the food. There was the research, and networking (not well, but some) with other researchers, and getting the chance to present my own research. But I think the catering will be the most memorable part of the conference, and something by which future conferences will be judged. After all, I am still a graduate student, and entranced by free food.
Showing posts with label conferences. Show all posts
Showing posts with label conferences. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Friday, April 10, 2009
My First Conference: Socializing
Perhaps the best thing about My First Conference was the chance to hang out with friends and/or colleagues. The other three grad students from my lab were there, and for the most part we were attending the same sessions. We formed a peanut gallery during the talks, exchanging whispered comments and questions about the talks in progress, and often remained together for meals. It's entirely possible that if they hadn't been around, I'd have spent Friday afternoon attending talks not very related to my research and burnt myself out, instead of heading out to a two-hour "happy hour" before our lab reunion dinner.
I also got to see some old friends who have moved on. My main collaborator (aside from my advisor) graduated from post-doc in our lab to professor in a different country a few years ago. After two years of mainly communicating via email, it was incredibly refreshing to sit down for an hour and brainstorm ideas in real time, with sketches that don't have to be scanned or created in PowerPoint. Our former lab coordinator, now a grad student in another state, was also there, stopping by our posters to catch up on all the news and progress, joining us for dinner one evening. In a career that feels so isolated - just me, my computer, and sometimes my Internet connection - seeing people in person and having whole conversations was a welcome experience.
The downside to all this socializing is that I didn't take full advantage of this being a local conference. I could have brought a bagged lunch most days, and had late dinners at home. Instead, I wound up with a coffee every day, lunches out, dinners out. I spent my entire "fun" allowance for the month in just four days, and four days at the beginning of the month at that. It was completely worth it, but I might have a hard time remembering that at the end of the month when I've had three months of bare-bones activities.
I also got to see some old friends who have moved on. My main collaborator (aside from my advisor) graduated from post-doc in our lab to professor in a different country a few years ago. After two years of mainly communicating via email, it was incredibly refreshing to sit down for an hour and brainstorm ideas in real time, with sketches that don't have to be scanned or created in PowerPoint. Our former lab coordinator, now a grad student in another state, was also there, stopping by our posters to catch up on all the news and progress, joining us for dinner one evening. In a career that feels so isolated - just me, my computer, and sometimes my Internet connection - seeing people in person and having whole conversations was a welcome experience.
The downside to all this socializing is that I didn't take full advantage of this being a local conference. I could have brought a bagged lunch most days, and had late dinners at home. Instead, I wound up with a coffee every day, lunches out, dinners out. I spent my entire "fun" allowance for the month in just four days, and four days at the beginning of the month at that. It was completely worth it, but I might have a hard time remembering that at the end of the month when I've had three months of bare-bones activities.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
My First Conference - Posters
The entire reason behind attending My First Conference was to present some of my research. End-of-year reviews are coming up for the graduate students, and just once it would be nice to have publications to show for my work. One poster presented my master's thesis, which I have since abandoned; the other presented what has become the first two experiments of my dissertation.
The master's thesis poster came first. This was my first-ever poster presentation, so I was greatly relieved to have a lab mate on the board next to me. (Originally, I had been scheduled to present both posters simultaneously, one on either side of my lab mate, but I got them to change one of them. I didn't fancy rushing through her crowd every time someone came up to one or the other poster). I also had very low goals for this poster. I abandoned my master's thesis research as soon as I defended it; I'd spent so much time on it I couldn't bear to even think about the topic any more. My advisor convinced me to submit the work so she'd have some way to cite it. I took 20 handouts, and they were all gone by the end of the session; this is as much as I'd hoped for. The thesis contained an overwhelming series of maybe-results, so I wasn't at all surprised that people listened to the summary with few comments and fewer questions.
The highlight of the poster session was when my advisor arrived, children in tow. She didn't talk to us for long, as she was sidetracked by people she can't talk to any day of the week. But, she did hold court with her (or her kids') admirers right next to our posters, and my lab mate and I spent most of our downtime watching her 6-month-old son gum at her name tag. I considered starting up some bets on whether he would abandon the lower-left corner to nibble on any of the others, but before I could he tasted one and abandoned it quickly. We started discussing why, and eventually settled on a dislike of the string attached to that corner. This is the kind of serious science discussions we engage in at the last session of the first day of a huge conference.
The dissertation poster came last, in every sense: my last presentation in the last session of the last day. It was surprisingly well attended. I put the poster up 20 minutes before the session officially started, and was asked for a summary immediately; attendance was pretty constant for the first hour, as people who weren't going to any of the symposia were trying to gain their freedom from the conference. There was a half-hour lull in the middle, at which point my co-author and I took turns going to check out other posters. Then there was a steady stream of people again, as they started leaving symposia early. We kept going until they turned the lights out (well, half the lights) promptly as 6 p.m.
As this was my dissertation work, I was much more sensitive to comments. I didn't have any of the troubles explaining our measures to people that I have at department talks; either I've gotten better with practice, or our department is overly critical. At least one person thought our explanation for our results made perfect sense, and no one directly challenged it. To me, this is the perfect level of critique; they asked questions to help them understand and connect to other material, and they have to go away and think about it before they can come up with a strong rejoinder. Once again, I gave away all 20 handouts, and had 4 people request electronic copies besides.
Overall, this qualifies as unmitigated success. So much of a success, in fact, that I'm considering submitting something to the next relevant conference, in October. We shall see.
The master's thesis poster came first. This was my first-ever poster presentation, so I was greatly relieved to have a lab mate on the board next to me. (Originally, I had been scheduled to present both posters simultaneously, one on either side of my lab mate, but I got them to change one of them. I didn't fancy rushing through her crowd every time someone came up to one or the other poster). I also had very low goals for this poster. I abandoned my master's thesis research as soon as I defended it; I'd spent so much time on it I couldn't bear to even think about the topic any more. My advisor convinced me to submit the work so she'd have some way to cite it. I took 20 handouts, and they were all gone by the end of the session; this is as much as I'd hoped for. The thesis contained an overwhelming series of maybe-results, so I wasn't at all surprised that people listened to the summary with few comments and fewer questions.
The highlight of the poster session was when my advisor arrived, children in tow. She didn't talk to us for long, as she was sidetracked by people she can't talk to any day of the week. But, she did hold court with her (or her kids') admirers right next to our posters, and my lab mate and I spent most of our downtime watching her 6-month-old son gum at her name tag. I considered starting up some bets on whether he would abandon the lower-left corner to nibble on any of the others, but before I could he tasted one and abandoned it quickly. We started discussing why, and eventually settled on a dislike of the string attached to that corner. This is the kind of serious science discussions we engage in at the last session of the first day of a huge conference.
The dissertation poster came last, in every sense: my last presentation in the last session of the last day. It was surprisingly well attended. I put the poster up 20 minutes before the session officially started, and was asked for a summary immediately; attendance was pretty constant for the first hour, as people who weren't going to any of the symposia were trying to gain their freedom from the conference. There was a half-hour lull in the middle, at which point my co-author and I took turns going to check out other posters. Then there was a steady stream of people again, as they started leaving symposia early. We kept going until they turned the lights out (well, half the lights) promptly as 6 p.m.
As this was my dissertation work, I was much more sensitive to comments. I didn't have any of the troubles explaining our measures to people that I have at department talks; either I've gotten better with practice, or our department is overly critical. At least one person thought our explanation for our results made perfect sense, and no one directly challenged it. To me, this is the perfect level of critique; they asked questions to help them understand and connect to other material, and they have to go away and think about it before they can come up with a strong rejoinder. Once again, I gave away all 20 handouts, and had 4 people request electronic copies besides.
Overall, this qualifies as unmitigated success. So much of a success, in fact, that I'm considering submitting something to the next relevant conference, in October. We shall see.
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
My First Conference - Networking
My advisor's recommendation for dealing with the overwhelming size of My First Conference was to contact potentially relevant people for individual meetings. This is rather more intimidating to me than a conference of 8,000 people, so I attempted one, and otherwise just attempted general networking.
My one meeting may or may not be considered a success. The professor didn't have a schedule planned, and suggested I come up after one of her talks. Naturally, of the four talks she was giving, two were during my posters, one was during a formal student lunch, and the last was right before one of the posters. I managed to avoid any stress over this by visiting her students' posters; she's the kind of professor who shows up to support her students, and I managed a quick conversation with her. This let me off the hook for trying to come up after a very popular talk. It was just a quick conversation, but I introduced myself, and she even asked if I was planning on doing a post-doc and whether I'd consider applying to her university.
My other formal networking attempt was the formal student lunch, which was a small group of a students and one "non-traditional" PhD in the field. This was the first opportunity I've had to talk to a PhD in my field who went into industry. I definitely got a good feel for what that career path is like, and I got to have the best cheesecake I have ever tasted. But, it did more to solidify my plan to go into teaching than to move me back toward the non-academic options.
Informally, I made some networking attempts at the pre-conference teaching institute. I chatted with people at their posters and at some round-table discussions. I even made myself send some follow-up emails the day after the conference (since I didn't have to spend the day traveling). I don't expect anything to come from any of these contacts, but they certainly made the conference more bearable.
Overall, I think just attending the poster sessions made the conference seem smaller. Yes, there were 180 posters at each session, but there were usually only 10-15 in any given sub-field, and never more than a half dozen that seemed interesting to me. It was easy enough to get the presenter's summary, and see if I could come up with a question or two. Even two minutes of one-on-one conversation in the crowd seemed like a healthy interaction, and a vital break from the endless hard-to-process research talks.
My one meeting may or may not be considered a success. The professor didn't have a schedule planned, and suggested I come up after one of her talks. Naturally, of the four talks she was giving, two were during my posters, one was during a formal student lunch, and the last was right before one of the posters. I managed to avoid any stress over this by visiting her students' posters; she's the kind of professor who shows up to support her students, and I managed a quick conversation with her. This let me off the hook for trying to come up after a very popular talk. It was just a quick conversation, but I introduced myself, and she even asked if I was planning on doing a post-doc and whether I'd consider applying to her university.
My other formal networking attempt was the formal student lunch, which was a small group of a students and one "non-traditional" PhD in the field. This was the first opportunity I've had to talk to a PhD in my field who went into industry. I definitely got a good feel for what that career path is like, and I got to have the best cheesecake I have ever tasted. But, it did more to solidify my plan to go into teaching than to move me back toward the non-academic options.
Informally, I made some networking attempts at the pre-conference teaching institute. I chatted with people at their posters and at some round-table discussions. I even made myself send some follow-up emails the day after the conference (since I didn't have to spend the day traveling). I don't expect anything to come from any of these contacts, but they certainly made the conference more bearable.
Overall, I think just attending the poster sessions made the conference seem smaller. Yes, there were 180 posters at each session, but there were usually only 10-15 in any given sub-field, and never more than a half dozen that seemed interesting to me. It was easy enough to get the presenter's summary, and see if I could come up with a question or two. Even two minutes of one-on-one conversation in the crowd seemed like a healthy interaction, and a vital break from the endless hard-to-process research talks.
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
My First Conference - Size Matters
The scope of My First Conference was huge. We took over the city's convention center and the neighboring hotel. My father didn't believe me when I said there were 10,000 people there. And it's true that I exaggerated. The official program guide declares that attendance is only "approaching 8,000". This includes 14 poster sessions of 232 posters each (that's 3,250 posters, each with at least one accompanying author). There were 42 different possible events to attend in the first session of the first day, each with 5 speakers (another 2,950). And then there's all the people who came despite not giving any presentations.
The good news is that the 8,000 people were nicely spread out, and the only time I felt the presence of the crowd was when waiting in line for coffee or trying to find a place to sit in coffee shops or restaurants. The bad news is that it was an almost completely anonymous conference; there was no chance to meet or even recognize other people interested in the same topics. I barely managed to find the people in my lab; fortunately, we were mostly attending the same sessions.
That said, I was recognized by someone from my undergrad university. I have no idea how she managed to recognize me, given that when I was in college my hair was two inches long and spiky (and, for one year, neon blue), and now it's shoulder length. I didn't recognize her at all, so perhaps the conference isn't so anonymous for anyone with a decent memory for faces. But the size still has to take some responsibility.
The good news is that the 8,000 people were nicely spread out, and the only time I felt the presence of the crowd was when waiting in line for coffee or trying to find a place to sit in coffee shops or restaurants. The bad news is that it was an almost completely anonymous conference; there was no chance to meet or even recognize other people interested in the same topics. I barely managed to find the people in my lab; fortunately, we were mostly attending the same sessions.
That said, I was recognized by someone from my undergrad university. I have no idea how she managed to recognize me, given that when I was in college my hair was two inches long and spiky (and, for one year, neon blue), and now it's shoulder length. I didn't recognize her at all, so perhaps the conference isn't so anonymous for anyone with a decent memory for faces. But the size still has to take some responsibility.
Sunday, April 5, 2009
My First Conference - Teaching Institute
My First Conference is over, after four hectic days of commuting, socializing, eating out - and, of course, attending symposia and a little networking. This week we'll step through some of the highlights of the conference, starting with the pre-conference Teaching Institute.
The teaching institute was first of all interesting from both the teaching and research perspective. The first plenary talk was on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning ("SOTL"), and can be summed as follows: 1) At best, results on teaching methods from a lab setting can only create a hypothesis for classroom teaching, not a definitive guide for practice; 2) Pedagogy research needs to take into account the individual differences of teachers and students, because claims about the evil/effectiveness of PowerPoint and other teaching tools depend entirely on the teacher's teaching style.
The second plenary talk focused on the outcomes of our teaching, pointing out that one of the reasons that public policy makers are so resistant to listening to scientific study (such as in NPR's report about banning phthalates in toys despite scientific evidence that they aren't harmful) is that we aren't teaching science that well. We need to not just teach the facts we learn from science, but how we know, how what we know changes with new evidence, and what we do not know yet. Another talk on this topic pointed out that we often teach using nothing but confirmatory evidence, which is completely contrary to scientific thinking.
Beyond giving me some cachet in my claims to be a dedicated teacher, and ideas for future teaching, it was an excellent introduction to the conference. A tiny fraction of conference attendees were there - only about 170, according to the organizer - and I was able to ease into the crowds, get practice on a poster session, and chat with people. And, the people I spoke with were ridiculously nice and helpful. The round-table leader I ate lunch with started offering suggestions on how I could present myself when applying for jobs, and one poster presenter was willing to talk about teaching at liberal arts colleges and was just incredibly enthusiastic in wishing me well on my upcoming job search and dissertation. Those informal experiences alone would have been worth the extra registration fee.
The teaching institute was first of all interesting from both the teaching and research perspective. The first plenary talk was on the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning ("SOTL"), and can be summed as follows: 1) At best, results on teaching methods from a lab setting can only create a hypothesis for classroom teaching, not a definitive guide for practice; 2) Pedagogy research needs to take into account the individual differences of teachers and students, because claims about the evil/effectiveness of PowerPoint and other teaching tools depend entirely on the teacher's teaching style.
The second plenary talk focused on the outcomes of our teaching, pointing out that one of the reasons that public policy makers are so resistant to listening to scientific study (such as in NPR's report about banning phthalates in toys despite scientific evidence that they aren't harmful) is that we aren't teaching science that well. We need to not just teach the facts we learn from science, but how we know, how what we know changes with new evidence, and what we do not know yet. Another talk on this topic pointed out that we often teach using nothing but confirmatory evidence, which is completely contrary to scientific thinking.
Beyond giving me some cachet in my claims to be a dedicated teacher, and ideas for future teaching, it was an excellent introduction to the conference. A tiny fraction of conference attendees were there - only about 170, according to the organizer - and I was able to ease into the crowds, get practice on a poster session, and chat with people. And, the people I spoke with were ridiculously nice and helpful. The round-table leader I ate lunch with started offering suggestions on how I could present myself when applying for jobs, and one poster presenter was willing to talk about teaching at liberal arts colleges and was just incredibly enthusiastic in wishing me well on my upcoming job search and dissertation. Those informal experiences alone would have been worth the extra registration fee.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
My First Conference, and Networking
My first conference approaches. Yes, I'm at the tail end of my fourth year of grad school and I haven't been to a conference yet, due to a combination of no research results and an unwillingness to spend the money to travel if I'm not presenting. But I'm jumping in with both feet: I'm attending what I'm assured is a large and overwhelming conference (over 3,000 posters presented across 14 sessions), attending a pre-conference teaching institute, and presenting not one but two posters. I'm not usually of the rip-the-bandaid-off mentality, so I don't know what's gotten into me.
Yesterday's meeting with my advisor has me as prepared as I can get. I know what I should wear (more formal than anything worn in our jeans-and-sneakers department, but no need to worry about a suit) and what I should bring to my poster session (a short and shorter prepared spiel, a stack of handouts for those who are interested but don't want to be dragged into a conversation, and a sign-up sheet in case the handouts run out).
And I have a plan for networking. This started out as a discussion of my career interests, at which I was reluctantly forced to realize I should be actively asking people about their jobs (teaching and research requirements) during the teaching institute, to find out if the kind of job I want even exists anymore (is it possible to be at a college and not have publish-or-perish pressure?). It was extended into my advisor's suggestions for making the conference less overwhelming, trying to arrange individual meetings with relevant people. This morning I struggled over a 4-line email to a very relevant person, trying not to beg for 10 minutes of her time.
Now that I think about it, the real reason I haven't been attending conferences is that I'm just an insular type of person. I try, or it feels like I try, but it's all I can do to have the minimum number of reference letters - it's almost inconceivable to me how people can know more than three people well enough to even ask for a recommendation. The most stressful part of the conference may well be attempting to talk to people instead of sitting quietly and learning.
Yesterday's meeting with my advisor has me as prepared as I can get. I know what I should wear (more formal than anything worn in our jeans-and-sneakers department, but no need to worry about a suit) and what I should bring to my poster session (a short and shorter prepared spiel, a stack of handouts for those who are interested but don't want to be dragged into a conversation, and a sign-up sheet in case the handouts run out).
And I have a plan for networking. This started out as a discussion of my career interests, at which I was reluctantly forced to realize I should be actively asking people about their jobs (teaching and research requirements) during the teaching institute, to find out if the kind of job I want even exists anymore (is it possible to be at a college and not have publish-or-perish pressure?). It was extended into my advisor's suggestions for making the conference less overwhelming, trying to arrange individual meetings with relevant people. This morning I struggled over a 4-line email to a very relevant person, trying not to beg for 10 minutes of her time.
Now that I think about it, the real reason I haven't been attending conferences is that I'm just an insular type of person. I try, or it feels like I try, but it's all I can do to have the minimum number of reference letters - it's almost inconceivable to me how people can know more than three people well enough to even ask for a recommendation. The most stressful part of the conference may well be attempting to talk to people instead of sitting quietly and learning.
Monday, January 5, 2009
Glad for Local Conferences
My first conference - first as both attendee and presenter - happens to be in the nearby major city. I won't be flying, or staying in a hotel, or doing any of those (I imagine) typical "conference" chores. I will be commuting by the free (with student ID) hourly bus.
At first this seemed pathetically anti-climactic. How am I supposed to feel accomplished if this conference is just a bus-ride away? Sure, it's better than the mini-conferences I've attended on campus, where it's less a conference and more a slight change of venue for the school day. But it hardly feels like an important step in the academic career. I'm sure this will change when I get there, and see how unbelievably huge the entire thing is as I man my posters in 2 of the 15 poster sessions. My advisor has promoted this conference to us as a chance to have the advantage of her "pointing people to our posters", since she no longer travels for conferences (and I'd better still not be her grad student by the time her kids are older enough for her to travel again).
The benefits of not having to travel only became apparent as I flew back from my winter vacation last night. The delay on the first leg of the trip didn't phase me; I had a 2-hour layover. The delay on the second phase was not pleasant, because I only had an hour and half to catch the shuttle away from the airport in the middle of nowhere. And after they got us on the plane a mere 45 minutes late, they left us sitting there for another 45 minutes while they sorted our luggage. This is a good reason never to fly through Atlanta, ever again. I cannot afford many $80 taxi rides home from the airport. It was only merest chance (and my moonlighting for my father's office over break) that I could afford one.
So when I think about my first conference being a local one, I will think less of the exotic travel I'm missing and more of the chaotic travel I'm missing. Nothing like a positive mood to start the new semester.
At first this seemed pathetically anti-climactic. How am I supposed to feel accomplished if this conference is just a bus-ride away? Sure, it's better than the mini-conferences I've attended on campus, where it's less a conference and more a slight change of venue for the school day. But it hardly feels like an important step in the academic career. I'm sure this will change when I get there, and see how unbelievably huge the entire thing is as I man my posters in 2 of the 15 poster sessions. My advisor has promoted this conference to us as a chance to have the advantage of her "pointing people to our posters", since she no longer travels for conferences (and I'd better still not be her grad student by the time her kids are older enough for her to travel again).
The benefits of not having to travel only became apparent as I flew back from my winter vacation last night. The delay on the first leg of the trip didn't phase me; I had a 2-hour layover. The delay on the second phase was not pleasant, because I only had an hour and half to catch the shuttle away from the airport in the middle of nowhere. And after they got us on the plane a mere 45 minutes late, they left us sitting there for another 45 minutes while they sorted our luggage. This is a good reason never to fly through Atlanta, ever again. I cannot afford many $80 taxi rides home from the airport. It was only merest chance (and my moonlighting for my father's office over break) that I could afford one.
So when I think about my first conference being a local one, I will think less of the exotic travel I'm missing and more of the chaotic travel I'm missing. Nothing like a positive mood to start the new semester.
Monday, December 1, 2008
Finally, Something Was Accepted
Technically, I didn't get much work done over my week-long Thanksgiving break. I responded to some student emails, I commented on my thesis student's end-of-semester paper, I contemplated my future. But, I feel very accomplished, because not one but both of my poster submissions to a major conference in my field were accepted.
This marks my first acceptance in anything (besides the master's thesis itself, I suppose) since I came to graduate school. My first poster, my first "publication" of any type, my first conference. Every other poster submission, workshop application, grant application, etc. has been rejected. So, four years into my graduate studies, and I finally have something with my name on it that can go on my CV. In fact, I have two of them.
One of the posters will be the only form of publication that my master's thesis gets, because I'm still refusing to follow through on anything that would make it paper-worthy. I almost refused to do the poster submission, but my advisor encouraged me to give her some way of citing the research in future. And perhaps the poster will make me feel like I actually accomplished something with that thesis.
This marks my first acceptance in anything (besides the master's thesis itself, I suppose) since I came to graduate school. My first poster, my first "publication" of any type, my first conference. Every other poster submission, workshop application, grant application, etc. has been rejected. So, four years into my graduate studies, and I finally have something with my name on it that can go on my CV. In fact, I have two of them.
One of the posters will be the only form of publication that my master's thesis gets, because I'm still refusing to follow through on anything that would make it paper-worthy. I almost refused to do the poster submission, but my advisor encouraged me to give her some way of citing the research in future. And perhaps the poster will make me feel like I actually accomplished something with that thesis.
Monday, August 18, 2008
New Year Career Crisis
Two weeks ago, I was not entirely successful in my struggles not to cry in the middle of a presentation directly relevant to the current section of my comps paper. For most of the past week, I have had an intense urge to either put my head down and cry onto my keyboard every time I have received the latest draft of four of the five papers I'm co-authoring. Diagnosis can go one of three ways:
1. Depression is rampant in our society, and every member of my immediate family (except maybe one sister) has been on medication for depression or manic depression at one point or another. I msyelf have a dubious diagnosis of depression hanging over from my freshman year of college. Perhaps it is time for professional help in regards to regulating neurochemicals.
2. Workaholicism also runs rampant in society and in my family. The pressure to get two abstracts submitted by Friday, two papers submitted before Advisor's impending delivery, help a student with her paper before that deadline, and get through a huge hurdle of my comps paper before Advisor's impending delivery, while attending two major multi-day conference/workshop sessions in two weeks and organizing the new TA orientation, has created an overabundance in stress. I spent too much of the past week and weekend working (i.e., pretty much all of it, aside from ~2 hours of exercise or leisure reading each day), and have no reserves left from my day at the beach in San Diego. I need to take a day away from campus, email, my work laptop, and reading in general.
3. What the fuck am I doing in graduate school? Progress is stalled on my comps because I have no interest in tackling the huge theoretical debate I have to tackle, but everyone else finds this interesting and worthwhile (it was the participant debate that set me off at the presentation). Endless drafts and post-review revisions and trying to write three papers on the same research is what academia is all about, so I should be thrilled to have so many studies worthy of submitting after the dearth of worthy reserach my first two years. Obviously I'm not cut out for this. Perhaps I should consider a brand new career path, maybe flipping burgers.
Deeper consideration suggests it can't just be #3. I'm giving myself a pass on my comps problems, because the huge theoretical debate is addressed in my comps only as a stumbling block: "if this take is correct, we can look at this cool manipulation; if not, well...". I would be totally into my comps if they would have just let me say #(*% the debate, it's not going to get resolved, and the evidence in favor the useful take is convincing enough to proceed. There are reasons I'm stuck with four drafts on the same idea (revisions to a publication I wasn't even part of are half of them) that are unlikely to repeat at any other point in my career (please!). There has been an ongoing career crisis in that direction for the past year or so, however.
Addressing the work overload is difficult. Thanks to comps, there's always something that needs to be done pressing on the back of my mind, so it's a matter of just ditching work rather than getting to a good stopping place. Re-evaluating assorted commitments means Friday, and probably Saturday, are now Grad Student Skip Days. My newly re-validated bus pass and I are taking off for anywhere not here. I am turning off the computers, ignoring the books, and either getting some sunshine or getting some expensive sugar.
Addressing the career crisis is less difficult. A very timely email has pointed me to a "Turning Points" career workshops just for graduate students. I will totally pay $60 for a six-week course on figuring out what I want to be when I grow up and how to be it. (Mild paranoia that three more people won't sign up to meet the 10-person minimum is adding to my stress load, however). And, I've enrolled in an entirely irrelevant education course I know nothing about (the title is probably Religion, Spirituality & Education, but abbreviations make it diffiuclt to tell) becuase I'd already maxed out tuition and fees anyway, so it's free!. Technically this adds to my workload, but the possibility of having non-optional chores with absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with my research is well worth it.
And, this day is ending early. There is absolutely nothing I have to do that is better off being done today poorly than tomorrow (hopefully) rejuvenated.
1. Depression is rampant in our society, and every member of my immediate family (except maybe one sister) has been on medication for depression or manic depression at one point or another. I msyelf have a dubious diagnosis of depression hanging over from my freshman year of college. Perhaps it is time for professional help in regards to regulating neurochemicals.
2. Workaholicism also runs rampant in society and in my family. The pressure to get two abstracts submitted by Friday, two papers submitted before Advisor's impending delivery, help a student with her paper before that deadline, and get through a huge hurdle of my comps paper before Advisor's impending delivery, while attending two major multi-day conference/workshop sessions in two weeks and organizing the new TA orientation, has created an overabundance in stress. I spent too much of the past week and weekend working (i.e., pretty much all of it, aside from ~2 hours of exercise or leisure reading each day), and have no reserves left from my day at the beach in San Diego. I need to take a day away from campus, email, my work laptop, and reading in general.
3. What the fuck am I doing in graduate school? Progress is stalled on my comps because I have no interest in tackling the huge theoretical debate I have to tackle, but everyone else finds this interesting and worthwhile (it was the participant debate that set me off at the presentation). Endless drafts and post-review revisions and trying to write three papers on the same research is what academia is all about, so I should be thrilled to have so many studies worthy of submitting after the dearth of worthy reserach my first two years. Obviously I'm not cut out for this. Perhaps I should consider a brand new career path, maybe flipping burgers.
Deeper consideration suggests it can't just be #3. I'm giving myself a pass on my comps problems, because the huge theoretical debate is addressed in my comps only as a stumbling block: "if this take is correct, we can look at this cool manipulation; if not, well...". I would be totally into my comps if they would have just let me say #(*% the debate, it's not going to get resolved, and the evidence in favor the useful take is convincing enough to proceed. There are reasons I'm stuck with four drafts on the same idea (revisions to a publication I wasn't even part of are half of them) that are unlikely to repeat at any other point in my career (please!). There has been an ongoing career crisis in that direction for the past year or so, however.
Addressing the work overload is difficult. Thanks to comps, there's always something that needs to be done pressing on the back of my mind, so it's a matter of just ditching work rather than getting to a good stopping place. Re-evaluating assorted commitments means Friday, and probably Saturday, are now Grad Student Skip Days. My newly re-validated bus pass and I are taking off for anywhere not here. I am turning off the computers, ignoring the books, and either getting some sunshine or getting some expensive sugar.
Addressing the career crisis is less difficult. A very timely email has pointed me to a "Turning Points" career workshops just for graduate students. I will totally pay $60 for a six-week course on figuring out what I want to be when I grow up and how to be it. (Mild paranoia that three more people won't sign up to meet the 10-person minimum is adding to my stress load, however). And, I've enrolled in an entirely irrelevant education course I know nothing about (the title is probably Religion, Spirituality & Education, but abbreviations make it diffiuclt to tell) becuase I'd already maxed out tuition and fees anyway, so it's free!. Technically this adds to my workload, but the possibility of having non-optional chores with absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with my research is well worth it.
And, this day is ending early. There is absolutely nothing I have to do that is better off being done today poorly than tomorrow (hopefully) rejuvenated.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Teaching & Technology Conference
My school's teacher program hosted a state-wide conference on teaching and technology, and as lead TA I got to attend free (on a "scholarship"). I also got to run back and forth between the tech building and my department, as my advisor was somewhat inflexible about me attending a conference on our lab meeting day.
As with any conference, the workshops were hit and miss. There were some interesting discussions about Web 3.0 and Students 2.0, and sessions on what a wiki is and how to make use of it. As far as highlights go, there are two:
1. At 8:30 Wednesday morning I was introduced to Zotero, a Firefox-based reference management software. I promptly spent my free time between workshops converting my previous, insane, Excel-based managment. The bibliography export isn't perfect (it insists on including doi information on half the references), but the ability to have all the information, including the abstract, saved by a click of the mouse is more than enough to make up for this. This new productivity should go a long way to appeasing my advisor over my attendance.
2. The lawyers presented on mind mapping software, which looked interesting enough - I'm tempted to check out the freeware. The interesting part, however, was that they were demonstrating their department's product ($$), and had mentioned to the company that it was being demonstrated, and had been given a book, software, and t-shirts to give away. The drawing for the freebies consisted of one presenter throwing everyone's cards up in the air, and the other trying to catch one. It was worth jotting down my name just to watch. (I got a t-shirt for coming up with a use of mind mapping software earlier).
3. An intriguing presentation on using Second Life as an educational tool. One presenter used a Second Life location as a substition for a powerpoint (a kind of distance learning opportunity, I guess), and the other demonstrated NOAA's Island of demonstration tools for teaching about science. None of these seem to apply to my discipline, but it was interesting to watch. How soon will we be fulfilling the science fiction fantasy of sitting at computers instead of attending classes?
As with any conference, the workshops were hit and miss. There were some interesting discussions about Web 3.0 and Students 2.0, and sessions on what a wiki is and how to make use of it. As far as highlights go, there are two:
1. At 8:30 Wednesday morning I was introduced to Zotero, a Firefox-based reference management software. I promptly spent my free time between workshops converting my previous, insane, Excel-based managment. The bibliography export isn't perfect (it insists on including doi information on half the references), but the ability to have all the information, including the abstract, saved by a click of the mouse is more than enough to make up for this. This new productivity should go a long way to appeasing my advisor over my attendance.
2. The lawyers presented on mind mapping software, which looked interesting enough - I'm tempted to check out the freeware. The interesting part, however, was that they were demonstrating their department's product ($$), and had mentioned to the company that it was being demonstrated, and had been given a book, software, and t-shirts to give away. The drawing for the freebies consisted of one presenter throwing everyone's cards up in the air, and the other trying to catch one. It was worth jotting down my name just to watch. (I got a t-shirt for coming up with a use of mind mapping software earlier).
3. An intriguing presentation on using Second Life as an educational tool. One presenter used a Second Life location as a substition for a powerpoint (a kind of distance learning opportunity, I guess), and the other demonstrated NOAA's Island of demonstration tools for teaching about science. None of these seem to apply to my discipline, but it was interesting to watch. How soon will we be fulfilling the science fiction fantasy of sitting at computers instead of attending classes?
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
It's Not the Receiving, It's the Reporting
The first of two attempts to get something publishable (i.e., meaningful) out of my master's thesis was a submission of a much simplified version of the thesis to a conference. The challenge was that the only discipline conference to submit to didn't just take poster abstracts on a first-come first-served basis (that was the conference I wanted to submit to when the research was in early phases, but which my advisor vetoed). Instead, you have to submit a six-page paper that would be published in the proceedings of the conference. Pros: reviews of the paper to be read, and more prestige than the normal poster presentation. Cons: submissions are actually reviewed, and get rejected.
At submission, I was of the opinion that the paper was much more interesting and convincing than it had been when written up as my thesis, but was still full of enough only-marginally-significant results that we weren't quite sure how to interpret that it certainly wasn't going to be worth trying to publish elsewhere (although my advisor will veto that opinion as well). The reviewers seem to agree: official verdict is rejection, but there was enough mixed opinion that we go four reviewers in three rounds instead of the two reviewers mentioned in the form response. Individual opinions range from 1/5 (unoriginal fishing expedition) to 4/5 (cautiously recommended as a talk, not just a poster).
I'm not any more upset about this than I was about my abusive FCQ commenter. Perhaps I'm going through an unemotional even-keel week, but I prefer to think I've finally matured to the point that I have realistic opinions of my work and appropriately healthy respect for other peoples' opinions. I can disagree with some of the comments (since when is considering three factors that have reasonable explanations for contributing to something "fishing"? would it be science if I picked my favorite theory and didn't even consider the alternatives?), but overall the comments are in line with my own opinion (not that I would tell my advisor this) of "somewhat interesting results but not at all impressive".
So I'm not bothered by the rejection. What I actually am bothered by is the expectation that my advisor won't let it die. I have no intention of mentioning the status to anyone else unless asked, because I don't need or want whatever consolation comes with manuscript rejection, but I have to notify my co-author. And she'll want to comment, and try to revise and submit it somewhere else, and I'm just done. I'm not particularly interested in following up on the research. I spent two and a half years on the topic, I was incredibly dedicated and fascinated at the time, but interest can only be sustained for so long. I have been forced onto bigger (if not better) things by the requirements for my comps paper, and I would much rather spend my time on the impending research and consign the master's work to the It Is Not Worthy annals of science.
The only question I want to deal with is whether I want to attend the conference as audience. It's an expensive prospect, since funding in my department is generally limited to people who are presenting research. But I've never been to a conference before, and it might be an important piece to figuring out what I want to do. If it's exciting enough, it might even tip me towards research over teaching. There is also the question of how important attending and presenting at conferences will be on my yearly progress reports, since I won't have a chance to present a poster before even next year's progress report is due. I don't want to get a letter or equivalent black mark for not working with the broader scientific community, just because my attempts to do so have been rebuffed.
At submission, I was of the opinion that the paper was much more interesting and convincing than it had been when written up as my thesis, but was still full of enough only-marginally-significant results that we weren't quite sure how to interpret that it certainly wasn't going to be worth trying to publish elsewhere (although my advisor will veto that opinion as well). The reviewers seem to agree: official verdict is rejection, but there was enough mixed opinion that we go four reviewers in three rounds instead of the two reviewers mentioned in the form response. Individual opinions range from 1/5 (unoriginal fishing expedition) to 4/5 (cautiously recommended as a talk, not just a poster).
I'm not any more upset about this than I was about my abusive FCQ commenter. Perhaps I'm going through an unemotional even-keel week, but I prefer to think I've finally matured to the point that I have realistic opinions of my work and appropriately healthy respect for other peoples' opinions. I can disagree with some of the comments (since when is considering three factors that have reasonable explanations for contributing to something "fishing"? would it be science if I picked my favorite theory and didn't even consider the alternatives?), but overall the comments are in line with my own opinion (not that I would tell my advisor this) of "somewhat interesting results but not at all impressive".
So I'm not bothered by the rejection. What I actually am bothered by is the expectation that my advisor won't let it die. I have no intention of mentioning the status to anyone else unless asked, because I don't need or want whatever consolation comes with manuscript rejection, but I have to notify my co-author. And she'll want to comment, and try to revise and submit it somewhere else, and I'm just done. I'm not particularly interested in following up on the research. I spent two and a half years on the topic, I was incredibly dedicated and fascinated at the time, but interest can only be sustained for so long. I have been forced onto bigger (if not better) things by the requirements for my comps paper, and I would much rather spend my time on the impending research and consign the master's work to the It Is Not Worthy annals of science.
The only question I want to deal with is whether I want to attend the conference as audience. It's an expensive prospect, since funding in my department is generally limited to people who are presenting research. But I've never been to a conference before, and it might be an important piece to figuring out what I want to do. If it's exciting enough, it might even tip me towards research over teaching. There is also the question of how important attending and presenting at conferences will be on my yearly progress reports, since I won't have a chance to present a poster before even next year's progress report is due. I don't want to get a letter or equivalent black mark for not working with the broader scientific community, just because my attempts to do so have been rebuffed.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Reviewing: The "Sandwich" Methodology
I am a member of the main organization for my field. Not because I am particularly interested in the organization, or the journals I receive, or because it looks good on a resume. No, I pay $60+ dollars each year for the privilege of being a student reviewer, and spending a few days of my time reading submissions and providing detailed feedback. In the Fall, I review submissions for student grants; in the Spring, I review submissions for several awards or presentation slots in the annual organization conference.
Why pay to volunteer my services as a reviewer? Partly because it's a change of pace from my normal graduate student responsibilities, partly because I'm passionate about making an undergraduate degree meaningful and this lets me train some students on writing and science even when I'm not a TA, and partly because it is interesting. None of the papers I get to review are related to my Area, and it's nice to spend time seeing a difference side of the Field.
Which is not to say that I'm thrilled with some of the requirements of reviewing. The review process is fairly well done. I return a scoring sheet with my final yes/no recommendation, and a one-page review with "a brief paragraph summarizing the proposal in your own words and a couple of paragraphs of feedback". The poor saps who got stuck coordinating each thing review our reviews (with the threat of sending them back for revision), and want them to have both positive and negative feedback. Sometimes this is hard. More to the point, I can't let go of training on cultural differences that says this is confusing.
As an undergraduate, I minored in American Sign Language. Our teachers were all Deaf (capitalization denoting a cultural group rather than simple physical difference), and courses including explanations of cultural differences. Among other things, Deaf people do not see it as rude to ask for information like how much money you spent on something (sharing information being very important in small communities) and do not like the "sandwich" method of feedback that is so popular in business these days. Tell someone good-bad-good, and the result is complete confusion on "am I in trouble? did you like what I did or didn't you?".
The review process wants us to say good things as well as bad, all in one page. Constructive criticism I can do: here's something I had a problem with, here's what I would have preferred to see. Trying to put lots of ego-boosting statements about things that seem so obviously okay/well done is just frustrating. How am I supposed to squeeze details about my substantive comments into a single page if I need to come up with something positive about the methods section immediately before saying "it wasn't there"?
Why pay to volunteer my services as a reviewer? Partly because it's a change of pace from my normal graduate student responsibilities, partly because I'm passionate about making an undergraduate degree meaningful and this lets me train some students on writing and science even when I'm not a TA, and partly because it is interesting. None of the papers I get to review are related to my Area, and it's nice to spend time seeing a difference side of the Field.
Which is not to say that I'm thrilled with some of the requirements of reviewing. The review process is fairly well done. I return a scoring sheet with my final yes/no recommendation, and a one-page review with "a brief paragraph summarizing the proposal in your own words and a couple of paragraphs of feedback". The poor saps who got stuck coordinating each thing review our reviews (with the threat of sending them back for revision), and want them to have both positive and negative feedback. Sometimes this is hard. More to the point, I can't let go of training on cultural differences that says this is confusing.
As an undergraduate, I minored in American Sign Language. Our teachers were all Deaf (capitalization denoting a cultural group rather than simple physical difference), and courses including explanations of cultural differences. Among other things, Deaf people do not see it as rude to ask for information like how much money you spent on something (sharing information being very important in small communities) and do not like the "sandwich" method of feedback that is so popular in business these days. Tell someone good-bad-good, and the result is complete confusion on "am I in trouble? did you like what I did or didn't you?".
The review process wants us to say good things as well as bad, all in one page. Constructive criticism I can do: here's something I had a problem with, here's what I would have preferred to see. Trying to put lots of ego-boosting statements about things that seem so obviously okay/well done is just frustrating. How am I supposed to squeeze details about my substantive comments into a single page if I need to come up with something positive about the methods section immediately before saying "it wasn't there"?
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Authorship Update
A compromise has been reached. Although my advisor prefers to err on the side of inclusion, adv accepted that there isn't enough time in this case (Proceedings submission due next Friday) to get them the prospective additional authors up to speed and give them some input in the submission itself. It's all in the phrasing...inclusion doesn't sound so great once you realize you're telling colleagues "we're putting your name on this, but not giving you the chance to make suggestions or even approve of it".
Should we attempt to get published in an official journal (Proceedings aren't "archival", so rules against double-publishing don't apply), an offer of authorship will be made to those who may feel some shared ownership of the project, with a careful and courteous explanation for why they were omitted from the poster. Which is fine with me; I don't mind sharing authorship, I just feel queasy with the potential of being author on a work you've never seen.
Should we attempt to get published in an official journal (Proceedings aren't "archival", so rules against double-publishing don't apply), an offer of authorship will be made to those who may feel some shared ownership of the project, with a careful and courteous explanation for why they were omitted from the poster. Which is fine with me; I don't mind sharing authorship, I just feel queasy with the potential of being author on a work you've never seen.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Hatchet Job
Back in college, I read a collection of short stories by a favorite author, Spider Robinson. In the introduction, he wrote about editing his first short story. Someone he respected told him to cut several thousand words from the "final" draft. He was sure there was nothing else to cut, he sweated over and mourned each deleted word, and he admitted in the end that the story was amazingly better.
Now, I find myself in the position of attempting to cut a 79-page master's thesis into a 6-page submission to the Proceedings of a conference. To be fair, that's a slight exaggeration: university guidelines request marshmallows (lots of white space, lots of pages with fluffy and sugary content) and conference guidelines request chocolate (ink-slathered pages of rich and condensed content). Still, it's nipping and tucking 15,250 words to roughly 4,500.
It's not that I'm attached to those 10,000+ words that are getting the delete button. Six weeks is just about enough time that I can stand to look at that document again after growing heartily sick of it during months of revisions, but not so much time that I've grown nostalgic about my first great academic work. In fact, I look at it with near-disparaging revisions. It would read so much better if I organized the results like so instead of so, this paragraph is too redundant, this sentence lacks elegance.
It's not that the 10,000+ words are necessary. The thesis requirements demanded inclusion every intention, step, and analysis in some specious attempt to validate my degree with hard work and a lengthy document. A conference submission, aspiring to be no more than a poster presentation, wants only slightly more meat on the bones than a mere abstract. Entire swaths of text, pages at a time, were cut for being unnecessary or unworthy. Failed analyses and non-significant "trends" can be ignored, tasks that added nothing in the end are removed from existence, citations added to bulk up the reference section can be adjusted to a single work by the same author.
It's just that it's a daunting task. After two days spent doing little else, I'm still at 6,700 words. The new angle, selected to make the results appear more meaningful and appealing, will require still more re-organization and re-writing of the discussion section, if not the introduction; this could take words off or pile them back on. My paper is on a yo-yo diet of cut and add, cut and paste.
In the darker moments, usually when scrolling through the now-26 pages in hopes of finding something else no one else would care about, I wonder whether it's at all worth it. I think of the day a few months from now when I receive the email telling me that the submission was very nice, thank you, but no one outside of the selection committee need be subjected to it. Will I be able to look back with a mature attitude, and say that my academic training wouldn't have been complete without such an intense and extreme revision process? Will I be willing to dust off the old analysis outputs yet again with an eye of trying toward publication in some journal? Or will I despair of having put this effort into a failed submission?
At the moment, I'm leaning toward seeing it as a learning experience regardless of the outcome. My explanations to various family members can now contain my concise but contentful descriptions of research past. It might even help convince them that my research is actually worthwhile. It's gone a surprisingly long way toward convincing me.
Now, I find myself in the position of attempting to cut a 79-page master's thesis into a 6-page submission to the Proceedings of a conference. To be fair, that's a slight exaggeration: university guidelines request marshmallows (lots of white space, lots of pages with fluffy and sugary content) and conference guidelines request chocolate (ink-slathered pages of rich and condensed content). Still, it's nipping and tucking 15,250 words to roughly 4,500.
It's not that I'm attached to those 10,000+ words that are getting the delete button. Six weeks is just about enough time that I can stand to look at that document again after growing heartily sick of it during months of revisions, but not so much time that I've grown nostalgic about my first great academic work. In fact, I look at it with near-disparaging revisions. It would read so much better if I organized the results like so instead of so, this paragraph is too redundant, this sentence lacks elegance.
It's not that the 10,000+ words are necessary. The thesis requirements demanded inclusion every intention, step, and analysis in some specious attempt to validate my degree with hard work and a lengthy document. A conference submission, aspiring to be no more than a poster presentation, wants only slightly more meat on the bones than a mere abstract. Entire swaths of text, pages at a time, were cut for being unnecessary or unworthy. Failed analyses and non-significant "trends" can be ignored, tasks that added nothing in the end are removed from existence, citations added to bulk up the reference section can be adjusted to a single work by the same author.
It's just that it's a daunting task. After two days spent doing little else, I'm still at 6,700 words. The new angle, selected to make the results appear more meaningful and appealing, will require still more re-organization and re-writing of the discussion section, if not the introduction; this could take words off or pile them back on. My paper is on a yo-yo diet of cut and add, cut and paste.
In the darker moments, usually when scrolling through the now-26 pages in hopes of finding something else no one else would care about, I wonder whether it's at all worth it. I think of the day a few months from now when I receive the email telling me that the submission was very nice, thank you, but no one outside of the selection committee need be subjected to it. Will I be able to look back with a mature attitude, and say that my academic training wouldn't have been complete without such an intense and extreme revision process? Will I be willing to dust off the old analysis outputs yet again with an eye of trying toward publication in some journal? Or will I despair of having put this effort into a failed submission?
At the moment, I'm leaning toward seeing it as a learning experience regardless of the outcome. My explanations to various family members can now contain my concise but contentful descriptions of research past. It might even help convince them that my research is actually worthwhile. It's gone a surprisingly long way toward convincing me.
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