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Unregistered Sushil Mujumdar 29 September 2010

How many conferences, and of which kind?

Posted in Conferences

Yet another conference invitation in my inbox, and I am wondering (again): how many conferences (broadly, meetings) should a scientist attend in a year? And of what kind, meaning, the large confluences of experts all over like a cleo, or the limited attendance meetings specialised in your research interest? In places where I come from, the first question is easily answered; one typically has funds to attend only one conference a year, two at the max if you are particularly endowed. Therefore, the second question becomes all the more important. What kind?

I have a liking towards the smaller meetings, more specialized and immediately relevant to my current work. On virtue of time available, these meetings allow for very relaxed interactions between participants. People are glad to talk at length about their recently published results, and also about things that were not published and were nonetheless interesting, and about things that they found ‘puzzling’ etc etc. People also tend to have a lowered guard in such meetings enabling freely flowing discussions about results. When the number of common interest individuals is large,  interactions lead to ideas that can be immediately implemented, either by two researchers together, or if not, by the individual. On a different note, when you get enough interaction time, you tend to notice the other side of the scientist, the non-scientific side, I mean. For a name that one normally only sees in the author list of a paper (and if you don’t agree with that paper, you don’t like the name), you tend to attach a more human description like humorous, cheerful, informal etc etc. You suddenly feel ‘in’. Go to the cleo-types, however, and suddenly all talks are near-perfect, all t’s are crossed, and i’s are dotted, all results are perfectly understood, and those that would not be understood, never happened.

If you were a graduate student in these parts, though, you would have, on the average, one go at an international conference during your PhD. And then you are better advised to make that trip in the last year to a cleo-type conference, with your postdoc apps already made and reference letters sent. All you do is meet these potential mentors. A personal meeting does a lot more than several emails, and most postdoc deals are closed in such conferences.

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  1. Otto Muskens

    17 Nov 2010 22:43, Otto Muskens

    I agree that smaller conferences with just one or two sessions are much more useful than the big ones in terms of meeting people and getting introduced into the community. As a starting research group we don’t have much travel budget either so I will go only go for an invited or contributed talk. It is a bit sad that especially the younger researchers cannot really go anywhere because for them it is especially important to get the network and get known in the community.

  2. Unregistered

    22 Nov 2010 15:18, pelf

    I did not get to attend any international conference during the 4 years that I was doing my Master’s degree, due to lack of funds (really?) and I had always wished that conference organizers or sponsors would secure enough funds to wholly or partially sponsor grad students from developing countries. Professors know many people enough to be able to find a way to a conference, but grad students don’t.

  3. Ad Lagendijk

    26 Nov 2010 16:40, Ad Lagendijk

    @pelf
    You have a valid point. If I were you in case of a special conference you are interested in I would directly write to one of the organizers and explain the problem. It would only work if you can make clear to him/her in some detail that your research subject is close to conference theme.

  4. Unregistered

    20 Jan 2011 19:00, Hel

    I agree with Otto, when we are phd student we don’t have enough budget to attend international conferences far away (e.g. in other continent). So the question for us it is not really “big famous international congress” VS “small specialized meeting” but “where are the closer meeting which i can attend with my travel grant” (generally in the same continent becaused flight ticket could be really expensive).

  5. Oleksandr Berezko

    30 Sep 2011 16:50, Oleksandr Berezko

    In my opinion big multidisciplinary events (large scientific forums or cleo-types as Mr. Mujumdar puts it) are more suitable for beginners in science – students or Ph.D. students of the first years of study. There they can form a wider view on their research area and surrounding areas. Specialized meetings are for “adult” researchers who are deep into their scientific interests and need qualified peer-review of the results.