Hi Adam here!
This past October, I was able to attend the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology’s (SVP) 83rd annual conference. It is held in different places each year, but this year, it was in Cincinnati, Ohio at the Duke Energy Convention Center. The conference lasts for a few days and is filled with talks, posters, workshops, events (like an awards banquet and auction where some very well-known paleontologists were dressed as Barbies (and Kens) and an assortment of Star Wars characters), and plenty of networking opportunities.
This was my first time attending SVP and it did not disappoint! I was able to attend a plethora of talks and posters throughout the conference. I learned a lot and it even got me thinking about some research questions that relate to my research. Unfortunately, I was not able to attend every talk since there were, of course, overlapping sessions. So, sometimes, I had to pick and choose which talks to go to even if there were two (or three!) happening at the same time that I wanted to attend. Sometimes this required me to walk (sometimes fast-walk) from one end of the conference center to the other and back multiple times to make the presentations I really wanted to see. But it was worth it!
Being the largest conference I have ever attended, it was overwhelming at times. But, thankfully, I attended SVP with a large group of people from the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences that I was able to stick with the majority of the time during SVP. As a group, many of us caravanned up from Raleigh, NC to Cincinnati, OH in a few fully packed cars instead of flying in since it was not too long of a drive. Plus, it was in October, so the leaves were changing and it was a beautiful drive up!
Driving in, as opposed to flying in, was perfectly fine by me especially since I had a poster presentation that I was doing at the conference. I had heard of airlines losing people’s posters before and I was worried about that. Luckily, I had no issues with my poster since we drove in a car to SVP. Not only was this my first SVP, but this was also my first poster presentation ever. I was very nervous to showcase my undergraduate research to professional paleontologists. My mentor made sure I was all set the day I presented my poster, which helped calm my nerves a bit. Once my poster session started, and people started coming up and asking questions about the research, the nerves went away and I just thoroughly enjoyed discussing my research with people who were at least somewhat interested in it. I received a lot of good feedback and people seemed genuinely interested in my work on Falcarius utahensis vertebrae.
Beyond the talks and poster sessions, there was plenty of time and opportunities to network with other vertebrate paleontologists between sessions and during some of the events such as the Welcome Reception at the Cincinnati Museum Center and the after party after the Rewards Banquet. I got to meet and talk to a lot of interesting paleontologists that were at different points in their careers from students to professionals.
It was a very unique experience where a bunch of people interested in vertebrate paleontology gathered together for a few days to talk about things we all love and to share ideas and research on that very topic. All-in-all, I learned a lot and gained a valuable experience while attending SVP. Now that I have been once, I can’t wait to attend again in the future!
