Graduate Women in Science (GWIS) is a smaller professional society of ~800 women in science around the United States. Once a year, they host a conference to bring women from across the STEM disciplines together, learn from and connect with each other!
2022’s GWIS conference was at my Alma Mater, University of Wisconsin-Madison, so of course I had to go!
The conference was scheduled: Day 1 meetings for local and grand chapters, Day 2 networking and socialization, and Day 3 was the meaty day full of scientific research.
What I Ate
While I was there, I reminisced in how my undergrad days, stopping at the Memorial union terrace for beer, and walking along State Street for dinner or coffee. (What else you can do in Madison, WI.)
What I Wore
For the conference itself, I stayed professional with a dress shirt and pants, but tried to wear more lightweight clothes since it is the middle of summer!
I also packed lightweight summer dresses for the dinners and (of course) my trusty supergas for walking & exploring.
What I Learned: Smaller Conferences vs Bigger Conferences
One of the biggest differences between this GWIS conference and the Exploring Biology Conference I attended earlier in 2022 was how much the size of the conference impacts what you get out of the conference. Now this isn’t to say at larger or smaller conferences you learn more, but there is a difference in what I learned.
Bigger conferences focus on cramming as much science as possible in as short amount of time.
Smaller conferences focus more on the interpersonal connections and career information you gather.
At this conference, which is much smaller than Exploring Biology (thousands+) at around ~100 people, I got to make much stronger connections with women doing things I really care about. And the sessions were much more interactive. One of my favorite sessions was turning your research into a story!
