The fourth annual Graduate and Professional Student Research Conference will feature workshops, research presentations and keynote speakers in an effort to promote intersectionality and networking among the different departments in the graduate college. 

The conference, sponsored by the Graduate and Professional Student Senate, will take place April 12 at Iowa State. The deadline for graduate students to submit an abstract to present their research at the conference is Tuesday.

This year’s keynote speakers are ISU alumna Kim Pastega, vice president of fabrication at Boeing Defense, Space & Security, and Shashi Buluswar, CEO at the Institute for Transformative Technologies and lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley. 

GPSS research conference chair Akshit Peer, doctoral candidate in electrical and computer engineering, said the organizing committee, which consists of a submissions and judging subcommittee and a planning subcommittee, meets every week and has worked hard while planning the conference. 

Peer said in addition to the research presentations, the conference also will host poster sessions this year for students from disciplines that focus less on research and more on creating tangible innovations. Furthermore, to accommodate graduate students from the College of Business, there will also be a case competition where students can present business ideas. These events offer a cash prize.

“The idea this time is to make the conference more inclusive in terms of all of the departments in the graduate college,” Peer said.

The conference also will feature workshops, including a workshop writing a statement of purpose for undergraduate students who are thinking of applying to graduate school, and a three-minute thesis competition, where students have three minutes and one slide to present a thesis to a judging panel.

“The main goal of this conference is networking and especially networking among different disciplines,” Peer said. “Another is to attract alumni to come see what their departments are working on and offer students recruitment opportunities.

While it is an open event, Peer encourages people who plan to attend to register so the organizing committee can get a count of possible attendees. The first 100 to do so will receive a free lunch at the event. Registration will open in March.

Students can submit abstracts for their presentations here and more information about the conference, including a schedule of events, can be found here.

If students or faculty have any questions about the event or have issues submitting their abstracts, email Peer at [email protected].

The deadline to submit an abstract to present at the Fourth Annual Graduate and Professional Student Research Conference is next Tuesday, Jan. 31.