Notes on a conference

 I've been at a conference in DC this week (an entire week, I myself am not quite sure why). This is a trip that I had to cut short and I return home day after tomorrow and I am looking forward to that. It has been nice to get a change of scenery, parts of this semester have been the equivalent of walking through water and quicksand all together. It was also the first conference where I presented (alone) from some research (really basic) I am doing on understanding expectations of organizations that host students for fieldwork. I think the presenting bit is supposed to be a milestone of sorts (but am also aware that a lot of people present at this conference, it seems to be more inclusive than exclusive, which is nice for newbies like me). I was really nervous but different folks pointed out that depending on who is presenting sessions are sparsely attended (true for the one I was in) and people present preliminary results of their work (I did).




I've definitely been conscious of an uncurling, an unclenching since I've finished my presentation. Nervousness around presenting is natural, even good, I've realized over the years. It pushes me to keep improving. We've (a bunch of other students at the conference from my university) been staying in a cute Air BnB (my first time), a five minute walk from the hotel where the conference is, and close to a lot of places to eat. I've attended a couple of sessions and while in each of them I've definitely learned new things (data sets and sources, approaches to research, names of authors and researchers in gender and education), none of them have felt exceptional to me. I've been trying to attend a lot of gender and education sessions, to understand how the two intersect, figure what is of interest, most meaningful for me.

I attended one session today after my presentation that I found fascinating (and fascinating is a function of what interests me). It talked about gender and mobility of international students. There was data from UNESCO Institute of Statistics and International Institute of Education's Open Doors project. There were numbers of international students from different regions and countries, the academic programs they pursue, graphs of gender parity indices and more. I did not know that these data sets existed, I've read reports by Brookings Institutions on international students but did not know that further data was available, disaggregated by region, gender and program. In a way, the gendered implications of student mobility and academic choices were far more clearly discussed than in the other bits I attended on gender, where the discussion seemed to range from gender as a binary vs. as a spectrum, and while the universe of gender issues was discussed, I was left feeling like I had nothing significant, no clear takeaway. I'd like to think there are others who find that disappointing. With this session, I left knowing about some of the latest research and names of people doing that work. For that itself, I'd call today a win. I've tried an Indian and Nepali restaurant in the last few days (I've been missing food) and I am ready to pack it up and call it a day. If I had planned better, I would have flown out tomorrow. At this point the benefit of being here is marginal compared to the comfort of being back home. But who knows, perhaps some more (quiet, calm) adventures await.