Last week four of my students (and myself) drove 5.5 hours in a rented van to Western Illinois University to attend the Midwest Ecology and Evolution Conference (MEEC). This conference is entirely organized by graduate students each year and had over 300 attendees. The conference is dominated by undergraduate and graduate students, making it a friendly atmosphere for students to present their work. Steve, Olivia, Jake, and Colin all presented their individual research projects via posters. The weeks leading up to the conference were crazy trying to get our data compiled, organized, and analyzed so that we could make the posters. The students did a great job meeting at all hours of the day to get these posters made and printed. Overall, I could not be happier with the experiences the students gained. During the conference we listened to about 15 student talks (15 minutes apiece) and attended two keynote speaker presentations. The second keynote speaker was simply amazing, it was presented by Scott Mills. I am a true fanboy of his research and have been citing him since my inception as a graduate student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Dr. Scott Mills studies the movement and spatial ecology of snowshoe hares and with his collaborators have begun to do some fascinating genetic work and phylogenetic reconstruction of snowshoe hare lineages throughout North America. The work he presented during this conference focussed on the increasing mismatch of hare fur color (they turn white in the winter) and snow cover. The length of time that snow is on the ground is decreasing, which is bad for hares that turn white for the winter/early spring! Enough of me geeking out. Back to the students! The students each got an opportunity to present their work, recieve feedback, answer questions, and build both new research ideas and also foster future collaborations. Several of my students are thinking about graduate school after they graduate from Washburn so this type of networking can be critical to their chances of being successfully admitted into a graduate school. It is also great for my students to see the work of other students. Particularly, it is nice for my students to see what other opportunities are out there should they pursue graduate school. As for interacting with other undergraduate students and their research, I think it is nice for my students to see their work is just as good as other undergraduates at other institutions, which likely validates their work in their own minds. Further, I think presenting one's own research is a great way of maintaining (or increasing) motivation to continue on with a research project and continue to collect high quality data. I am excited that my students had a great time and all four said they would love to go back to a conference again in the future! I could not ask for more from my research students. Because this trip could not be all work, we stopped at a State Park (Mark Twain State Park) which was situated about halfway between Western Illinois and Washburn. We roamed around for about an hour, looking for animals and enjoying the unique habitat. We all agreed we'd definitely like to go back during the spring/summer. I highly recommend!
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