Early Retirement Extreme Forums

http://humanmicrobiomecongress.com/

I want to go. I would not pay $500 to go.

Mrs. Ego volunteers at the Yoga Journal conference when in comes to our town and get's access to all the fun. The microbiome conference has plenty of grad students for volunteers and I have no connections (gotta work on that). I only want to attend a few sessions.

Any ideas?

ps. I don't want to sneak in.

@Ego Is this an event where sessions will be video captured? If so then one of those grad students (or other attendees) may be able to give you access to the recordings online after or during the show. Or it could be worth asking the speakers who you are interested in whether they will have a recording available. Flattery works wonders with academics and they likely won't have received any fee for speaking.

It might be worth writing to one of the sponsors to find out whether they have a package of tickets as part of their sponsorship. It may be that they could use some help in exchange for free passes to the event which they won't be using.

Being a steward (the grad student role) might not work out that well if you are sent to support sessions which conflict with the ones that you would specifically like to go to.

Last ditch would be trying for a press pass. Perhaps you could cover this for the ERE press?

@saving-10-years, Great tips!

I don't know about video capture but I'll ask. I've emailed the conference to volunteer. I hadn't thought of trying the sponsors directly. That's brilliant. Thank you!