Sunday, October 19, 2008

Analyzing scientists at a meeting: 5 of 5

Written 10/1/08, posted later
This is the fifth and final post from the grant agency meeting.

The organization of this meeting is okay. The schedule could have used some proof-reading. Today there were two talks scheduled for the same time. Yesterday there was a 15-minute void.

My poster was also listed wrong. The title was completely wrong and it was listed under my advisor's name on the printed list. At least they fixed it on the website.

There was half an hour at the end of each sessions for discussion, but each half hour was way over-scheduled. It was another case of scientists-have-no-sense-of-time. These discussions were also dominated by a few people each time. They were generally not terribly enlightening. They more served as a summary of the session, so if you were listening to the talks, the summary was useless.

My advisor seemed to know that this meeting would be dull and hinted that most academic meetings are like this. I suppose I'll have to suffer through them for quite a while. When I am my own PI, I'll be able to choose the meetings I attend and I'll choose ones that are more generally interesting to me. I hope to include some that emphasize education as well as science research.

Anyone want to ruin my rosy view of the future?

Up next: the post-poster post

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