Why don't *You* organize a conference?
A scientist should behave as a good citizen in the scientific community. You cannot expect that other colleagues perform all the unpleasant jobs and that you can spent all your time on science. I am referring to low-reward activities like reviewing papers, reviewing grant proposals, sitting on review panels, being an editor of a scientific journal, sitting on program committees and - which is the subject of my present post - really organizing a conference.
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My Advice
Try to stay away from organizing a conference. I have always been quite successful in not organizing them.
Ha! I organized two. And am in the midst of organizing the third. And it is not bad at all!
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The current forum discussion on PRI/BBC The World is Tackling the Global Organ Shortage. This week's guest is Dr.
We know they speak in dog-whistles. If you were wondering what Sarah Palin meant by dissing 'community organizers', she was not thinking about Jesus, or Martin Luther King Jr, or Mahathma Gandhi....just so you know who their base is....
Kenneth Chang, guest-blogging at TeirneyLab, laments the use of the word "organic" in both the contexts of organic chemistry and as a term for natural foods:
Speaking of which, lunch tomorrow?
Of course different scientists will favor different subsets of the low-reward activities. I'm much happier reviewing papers and grant proposals and working as a member of a review panel or program committee, than I would be organizing a conference. There are a number of university committees that can be very time-consuming, but low-reward (at least in the short run). Admissions committees for medical and dental schools are an example of this. Also, organizing, not to mention attending, a conference that is out-of-town for you may be difficult or impossible, if your teaching load is heavy and immovable (as is mine).
But I think that scientists who refuse to take on any of these low-reward community activities, because their research is "too important" or whatever, should be voted off the academ-island.