POSSCON Ahoy!

Hello all...it is nearing the time of POSSCON. Anyone reading this who does not know what POSSCON is should definitely check out this link. As part of our 462 curriculum, we are required to attend at least one day of POSSCON this year. I'm conflicted right now because the day I can attend the day I want to attend are two different things. I would LOVE to attend all three days, but this becomes difficult because of classes and things of that nature. Unfortunately the only day I can really go is Friday (labs have pretty strict attendance policies for some reason). I am, however, going to blog about the 3 presenters I really want to see (even though they will not be speaking or may not be there when I am)..I will also mention one or two from Friday, being that those are people I have a higher chance of meeting.

The three speakers that I would really enjoy getting the opportunity to meet with are Walter Bender, Leslie Hawthorn, and Bryant Patten. The main reason I would like to meet Walter Bender is because I am currently working on software for his organization (Sugar Labs). It would be interesting to hear straight from the horse's mouth what brought about the idea of Sugar Labs and what he expects to come from the organization.   It would also be interested to find out his research background (being that I am interested in continuing research outside of undergrad) and see how big of a role it played in his career now.
Being that I am a female in technology, I feel it is only befitting for me to try and meet at least one female in technology. it doesn't look like any of the speakers for Friday are female, but hopefully there will still be people there from the previous days. Aside from her sex, I would really like to meet her to get to discuss with her exactly what it is she does. For our FOSS project, I am in charge of Outreach/Documentation so it would be interesting to find out what it's like for someone who does it for a living. Again, I am also interested in her research background and the role it has played in her current success.
Last, but not least, I would like to be able to meet Bryant Patten. The research I am currently involved with deals with educational software, as well as the software my team and I are working on, so it would behoove me to speak with him as well. I can definitely see myself working with educational software further down the road, so that is more incentive for me to meet him. I would love to know, as with the other two, his research background and whether it played a role in his career decision. Also, I wasn't able to find as much information on this speaker as the other two, so I would also be interested in finding out how his career got started as well as any advice he'd like to dish out.

There aren't many speakers on Friday, so I haven't quite decided which 3 I would like to meet...I'll keep you posted on what I come up with.

Until next time... :)