A School outing for Grown-ups

Conferences are a big feature of the academic world, irrespective of the field or discipline. In my mind they serve 3 main purposes, 1) the exchange of knowledge, 2) idea generation, and 3) social exchanges and networking. This past week, the Institute of Psychology at the University of Lausanne hosted the 17th European Conference on Personality. It was a great success.

About a year ago, my thesis director who was appointed chair of the local organizing committee asked me to join the organizing committee - I was honoured by his invitation and happy to say yes, I knew that being part of the committee would be an excellent experience. I helped with numerous tasks including fundraising, publicity, preparing 500 conference bags and coordinating with our keynote speakers. My main task was to recruit and prepare our team of 20 + volunteers,  schedule their activities and be responsible for them during the conference. I also took the initiative to organize an event for young researchers at the conference - a lunch time session on publishing with the editorial board of the European Journal of Psychology, a prestigious journal in our field.

We had just over 500 participants for the conference, 7 keynote addresses, 11 invited symposiums, 30 regular symposiums, 24 paper sessions and 2 poster sessions. This represents more than 280 individual pieces of academic work (not including all the posters!). The conference program also included a number of tourism activities and social activities during the conference - a welcome reception with food and live music, two apéros coinciding with the poster sessions, and a fantastic conference dinner aboard a boat on the lake - wow. As one of the conference participants described it, "it is like a school outing for grown-ups"!

From an organization perspective, the conference went so smoothly - of course we had a few minor glitches along the way, but these were all addressed quickly and professionally. The team were fantastic and were all engaged, competent and ready to help. There was a great atmosphere during the conference and up until now, we have only received positive feedback. The quality of the work presented was high, the developments in the field impressive and I have no doubt that this conference has generated many new ideas and connections between people.

For me personally and professionally, this conference was a key event. I learnt so much by being on the committee - from conference organization, to logistics at the University, to academic politics, to leading a team, all made that more interesting because a lot of it took place in French. I found myself switching between English and French during the preparation phases and during the conference depending on who I was speaking to. I was very intentional about networking at this conference and most of my lunch and coffee breaks consisted of meetings with key people which I know will lead to many good future collaborations. I was so impressed by how willing these senior people and professors were to meet with me and share their knowledge and the way they were so encouraging of me and extended such kindness - I most definitely want to be that type of person.

Although tired after a full and intense week, I feel energized, ready to tackle the final stages of my PhD with creativity, academic rigor and persistence. I am excited about the future possibilities, and so grateful be doing something that is so personally satisfying - I look forward to seeing how it will develop and become a source of good for others too.

Jazz on the Train!

Since moving to Switzerland, the Montreux Jazz Festival has become one of my favourite activities. Hosted every summer in the town of Montreux (only 20minutes from Lausanne by train), it is apparently the second largest annual jazz festival in the world. This year, my friend Megan and I decided to try something different, so we bought tickets for "Jazz on the Train" without having any idea what we were getting ourselves in for! My goodness, where we pleasantly surprised!

After arriving at Vevey train station, we followed the music to the platform where we found a beautifully restored old steam strain (that was built in 1902) waiting for us and a jazz band playing on the platform. We found a spot in one of the cars and then two of the musicians came to join us and played for us until the train's first stop. No lights, no sheet music, no fancy equipment, just amazing music as the train chugged up the hill and we took in the gorgeous views (Switzerland never disappoints in that department!). Every 20 minutes or so the train would stop, and all the musicians would regroup outside the train to continue the concert, before a new set of musicians would come and join us in our car. This continued for about 1.5hours, until we stopped at the museum at Blonay-Chamby. We thought this was just another little break, but we were wrong!

After wondering around for a little bit, and guessing what we thought would happen next, we noticed a group of people heading into what we later realized was the exhibition of the museum. People were serving food and drinks and there were a whole lot of chairs set up, so we decided to join in the party. Shortly after this, one of the most amazing live music performances I have ever seen started. Using mostly percussion and rhythm, with some wind instruments, a group of musicians (who were all quite young) treated us to a dramatic performance using the old trains as their stage. Stories were woven into the performance, and at times we couldn't tell if the musicians were improvising, or if everything was rehearsed - we could not figure out how they were keeping such precise rhythms, that kept changing, and suddenly starting and stopping (at one point they all played with their eyes closed!). I was spell bound for the entire hour long show.

 Megan and I found seats in one of the cars for our return journey, and we had a good laugh after one of the conductors came (he was also dressed up!) and told us that the car we were in would actually be staying at the station, so we may want to find another one :) All in all, it was 5 hours of pure enjoyment and it was wonderful to share with the lovely Megan! This experience is most definitely on my "highlights list"!

An expert selfie taken standing at the back of the moving train!