When Annie Zeng walked into her first research conference last May, she didn’t arrive with a lab group or a familiar cohort of classmates. She arrived alone, and she immediately felt like it.
“I honestly felt very nervous,” said Annie, a senior pursuing a double degree in mathematics and computer science. “I was going by my own so that was very intimidating for me.” The first day didn’t make it easier: “Everyone kind of knew each other and was talking to each other, and I didn’t really know anyone there, so it was extremely off-putting.”
Fortunately, “after I got to know at least one person in the conference, then introducing myself to other people just became a lot less off-putting,” Annie said.
That small shift from an outsider to participant demonstrates what more undergraduates are discovering—research conferences are not just for graduate students. This formal gathering where researchers present, discuss, exchange ideas, and build professional networks has become a new proving ground for undergrads who want their work taken seriously, and who want to meet the people influencing the field they are considering entering.
U of I has long hosted undergraduate research showcases, and they’ve grown into major campus fixtures. The Illinois Office of Undergraduate Research (OUR)’s annual Undergraduate Research Symposium, for example, has been held since 2008 and has grown to include over 800 students. That on-campus visibility has become a kind of runway, where students start by presenting to peers and mentors in familiar buildings, and eventually take the next step by presenting work to professional audiences, often out of state, and sometimes out of the country. For some, funding makes that ultimate step possible. The OUR offers a Conference Travel Grant of up to $400 to help subsidize costs for student presenting at professional conferences; additional support, such as a Research Support Grant offering up to $2,000, can help undergraduates build independent projects that later becomes conference presentations.
U of I undergraduates may not be overshadowing more advanced graduate students at research conferences anytime soon. But more of them are showing up, sometimes because of a suggestion from a mentor, sometimes because a travel grant made it feasible, sometimes because an email subject line caught their eye at the right moment.
And once they’re there, they’re doing what researchers do: presenting, listening, swapping contacts, and quietly realizing they belong in the room.
Learn how more undergrads are using this "hidden curriculum"