Wednesday, October 31, 2007

International Society of Vertebrate Paleontology Annual Meeting Savings Year

Most of us involved in one way or another in academia are probably not strangers to financial hardship. As a part-time student with a full-time job, I'm probably better off than most students, and I'm still below "livable wage," especially in my corner of the country. While travel grants are often available, funding a weekend trip to a society meeting can still break the bank.

I may be jumping the gun a bit, seeing as I haven't yet become a formal member of SVP, but I am 99.9% sure I want to go to next year's annual SVP meeting in Cleveland, OH. And I'm also sure that if I don't start saving for it now, I won't be able to afford it, come October.

So, for all of you poor paleo people (ppp) who are in the same boat, I propose we do an offshoot of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWrMo) and set up a savings plan. The idea is to make a commitment to yourself and a few other people to save a certain amount of money, per week, to put towards travel costs. You can set a goal and monitor it on your site, much like NaNoWrMo folks, all the while inspiring other ppp to do the same.

There's a word cash counter here, to let others monitor your progress.

My goal is $2200 (for two people), so I'm hoping to save about $275 every month until the end of July.

Let me know if you're interested in the comments section of this post!

2 comments:

Zach said...

Done. I am going to next year's conference.

Anonymous said...

Amanda I think that is a fabulous idea! SVP is expensive, and as a direct result of hotel costs relating to this year's meeting I put off buying groceries and other essentials for far longer than I should have (bad times). I will think about what savings seem like a realistic and attainable goal and join in! Thanks for the idea and initiative!