I'm really excited about the symposium idea I developed with a friend at Big Meeting. We've had nothing but positive feedback on it, so we're going to move forward and propose the idea for next year's meeting. I'm super jazzed about the idea as well as a little thrilled at the prospect of putting together the session -- having a legit reason to interact with famous scientists, getting additional exposure, etc. Of course, the proposal has to pass review, so our chances aren't outstanding, but just making an attempt will be good for us.
This friend needs a pseudonym. I'll call her...Cauliflower. She is a pretty close colleague despite working several states away. We had the same fellowship that required us to attend yearly workshops so we've been seeing each other annually for that in addition to seeing each other at other conferences. Our advisors collaborate, and now Cauliflower is collaborating with my advisor on a dissertation improvement project that had her staying with me while she worked in our lab for a month. She has graduated now, but she will return again during the winter to finish the project. We do extremely complementary work, so I can see us having a very long-lived collaboration.
Anyway, I had an interesting revelation today. It's possible that every speaker we invite to participate in our symposium could be a woman, without us even trying. We've been brainstorming names for several days, so today I started to make a list to organize our ideas. Almost every candidate is female. Since I don't want to be a hypocrite, I will try for better gender balance in our session. Plus, there are a few men who would make excellent contributions. But still, that's pretty cool, huh?
8 comments:
That is awesome, on both fronts. I am glad that you had such a great experience. The symposium is going to be a lot of work but it will be a great way to get your name out there as well as to interact with some superb scientists.
That is pretty awesome. I think I can come up with only a few women in my sub-field. Perhaps there are more that just don't get any exposure? Hmm...
But yay for getting positive feedback. Is the proposal process really that rigid? It seems like if you've gotten nothing but positive feedback, then you shouldn't have a problem getting it approved?
please keep us in the details. I've never heard about the process of suggesting a symposium . . except the e-mails I get about the deadlines.
Sounds like an amazing opportunity. I would never have had the guts to try anything similar when I was a student, so massive kudos to you and Cauliflower! (I am desperate to know why you chose that name).
A former labmate of mine went into conference organising as a career, straight out of her PhD, and I always thought it sounded pretty cool!
Very cool, ecogeofemme.
And what a great opportunity for you and Cauliflower! (I am also curious as to why you chose that name). Kudos and good luck on organizing your symposium!
That's really cool! I'm not sure whether the conferences in my field accept symposium idea submissions, but perhaps they should!
Of course you will have some schmuck comment on here about a conspiracy that women are taking over the planet. WHOO HOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I came up with a whopping 1 woman to bring in on topic A, 2 women for topic B, and I'm still searching on topic C for a woman for a multi-disciplinary grant proposal. So far, there's 30 men. and me. I hope they accept my invite... and I hope they can reach out to other women I don't know of (yet). I dream of the day I can rattle off an allstar women's team in my field!
tag!
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