professional conference presentations

[mlle]

So, for those of you who have actually been through this already, I'd like your input...

I'm finishing up an MA in the social sciences (non-thesis--and unlike everyone else here, I don't plan on getting a doctorate). It's not a requirement for me to graduate, but it's expected that I go to a certain annual professional conference this spring to present a poster of my practicum work. I submitted the abstract and got accepted. As I try to put together the poster, it is sinking in how truly unsubstantial the project I did at my practicum really was: The "product" of my practicum is certainly not publishable quality, therefore it's not something I would want to share publicly to everyone in my field. I am not confident I would be able to defend my "methods" or even the "results" in detail if someone were to probe or grill me.

I know poster presentations are pretty laughable and are not exactly what makes your career among you (aspiring) academics, but I don't want to fly across the country to stand next to a poster for 3 hrs and present very pathetic data to underwhelmed Ph.D. passerby who may or may not deconstruct my work. I'm thinking it may be wisest to just not do this.

I guess my question is, what do you think? Should I try to throw this thing together and go for broke, or is it best to stay home in this case? I know it varies by field and how big or small the professional organization is, but how grueling are poster presentations in general? I know this post is incredibly naive, but really, I've never presented anything of any kind before outside of class....

[IvyHope]

Poster presentations are not grueling. If someone doesn't like your poster, they will usually just move on. If you're not going into academia, then I'd say there's no real reason to go to the conference and present, honestly. Many will likely disagree with me, but that's my opinion.

I can't think of a reason why it would be "expected" for you to go in order to graduate, but if that's the case, then they should at least offer some kind of financial support for you to go.

[t_ruth]

I'm all for doing things if you can that keep the most possible future options available to you. If there is even a 1% chance that some time in the future you may want to go back for a PhD (or do anything where this presentation would make a difference on your CV), then I would do it.

[graciado]

I'm all for doing things if you can that keep the most possible future options available to you. If there is even a 1% chance that some time in the future you may want to go back for a PhD (or do anything where this presentation would make a difference on your CV), then I would do it.

I would tend to agree with this. Particularly if you are moving into another career track after graduation, the very fact of having performed such a presentation (and any defence of your work, if anyone actually tries to grill you!) would certainly make you stand out. That will be invaluable to you for a fair time to come, whereas even if it does turn to be not the best fun in the world, the presentation itself is exceedingly brief.

[mlle]

Thanks for the input, guys. I read the replies and have been brooding like a moron over the whole damn thing all this time. I ended up getting into this in the first place b/c my advisor kept badgering me over email an in person all last semester about did-you-send-in-the-abstract, and then she sent in her letter of support for the travel grant without my really asking her to; so yeah, that's where the pressure I felt to go came from.

Soooo.....it looks like I'll be presenting at this stinkin conference, b/c a day after I talked myself into booking the flight and going, I freaked out and changed my mind and tried to cancel the flight. But alas, the flight is predictably non-refundable, and it isn't like the grad school is going to reimburse me for a flight to a conference at which I didn't present.......so I'll be going later this month. Sounds like a beautiful disaster waiting to happen, right? I'm actually trying to "design" the damn poster right now (er, supposed to be, rather than visiting this forum) even though I should have finished it by now.

I am going to need SO much Xanax for this conference...... :!:

[ec86]

Don't worry about it, presenting at conferences is fun! Free food and you get to visit another part of the country. It doesn't matter if your results are not substantial, the fact that you are presenting at a conference shows your willingness to participate in the academic community. "Knowledge exchange" is a pretty big deal nowadays, especially in the health sciences.

[vitaminquartet]

Few points:

1. As mentioned - presenting at conferences is fun. You get to meet people, talk about your work, talk about other people's work, read interesting stuff, listen to interesting talks, ask interesting questions, look at literature academic publishers bring, probably go to a fancy conference banquet, probably go to a nice conference cocktail hour, etc, its really a good time, enjoy it.

2. I can understand being nervous about giving a conference talk (which is what i think of when i hear "presentation" ) but for a poster, there is totally no need. You most certainly do not have to stand near your poster for 3 hours straight, thats crazy. Even if thats a requirement (which it wont be) you can just leave and look at other people's posters or go to the conference talks. No one is going to grill you - the more likely result is that people wont read your whole poster or any of it at all, if they aren't already sympathetic to your approach and position.

3. Try to make it visually appealing. While I've given talks at many conferences, I have only presented a single poster (in my fields, philosophy and law, posters are rare to non-existent, it was an interdisciplinary conference) and I so regret how I presented my paper: I basically just pasted up a summary of my arguments in three vertical columns and only a handful of people read it. Posters should look attractive and present information in a way that isn't tiring or time consuming to read. People just don't have the patients to deal with posters that they do to deal with articles and talks.