The BEAR conference has now been running for over 10 years and was originally created to give PhD students experience in running a conference, as well as provide a showcase for the fantastic research done on BEAR. With previous support from the Graduate School and our suppliers, we have been able to provide catering as well as prizes for the best talk and poster.
We are asking for PhD students and also early-career researchers (who can guide/help) from across the University to join the organising Committee. Preference is given to BEAR users, however enthusiasm is key for the role! BEAR’s Research Engagement and Data Group will be on hand to support and guide the students, together with the BEAR User Group Chair (Dietmar Heinke from Psychology), the wider BEAR Team and our suppliers.
It gave me the chance to add valuable experience to my academic CV. It was great to learn by doing and to challenge myself by taking on the marketing and social media role in the team.
Yordanka Dimcheva – Modern Languages
Key tasks of the Committee:
- Assigning Committee roles
- Setting deadlines, including the date of the conference
- Arranging advertising (to disseminate via email, blogs and any other social media platforms)
- Utilising different technologies to accept abstracts / posters
- Reviewing abstracts & assembling a programme, including inviting Academics to be keynote speakers
- Arranging catering
- Sourcing funds & prizes from suppliers / Graduate school
- Creating a final publication of abstracts to be made openly available online
Being a member of the Committee provides a great opportunity for PGR students to improve their communication and teamwork skills and is a very useful addition to an Academic CV. Previous members of the Committee have described their experience and how it benefitted them in the BEAR PGR Conference blog post and ‘A View from the Inside’.
Details on last year’s BEAR Conference are available in the BEAR Conference 2024 blog post, or read about older Conferences here.
If you are interested in joining the Committee, please email us at bearinfo@contacts.bham.ac.uk and we will be in touch.
On behalf of Dietmar Heinke – Chair of the BEAR User Group