Personal Blog 01 – ICML’22 diary of SM
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July 31, 2022ICML’22 – How was the starting journey?
Last May’22, I participated in a conference at Cornell University. There, I talked with some professors, and one of the professors from Cornell University suggested participating in ICML. That professor was also an organizer of that conference. Before it, I didn’t know about ICML! My professor, Dr. Jiang also suggested checking about ICML. Later, I noticed that ICML is one of the top machine learning-related conferences. So, I started processing for ICML. Unfortunately, ICML didn’t select me for the grant, they just granted my registration fee waiver, and later, I secured it differently! And also it’s from ICML! So big thanks to ICML.
Airfare – How was the fare minization process?
I need to mention that this is my second in-person conference, so within the USA, air ticketing is my second time. So you could say that I am a newbie. I searched from my home airport MFE to BWI, and the fare was above $650! I was so in a dilemma about whether I could go or not. Later, I used my nearest airport, HRL, and at that time, fare was $475! It’s reasonable for me. I purchased that one. But have a hidden story for it! It’s coming!
Tips: Select the nearest big airport, like in my case, Houston (HOU/IAH). If I did it, in that case, return fare would be less than $150, and bus route from Edinburg to Houston it’s only $100 (return) and 5 hours journey. It’s so good for me.
Starting at ICML – Was it good or bad?
Yes, starting at ICML was terrible for me.
There were two reasons. The first one was I selected a no plane change flight, which was about 6 hours long!! I didn’t consume any food without pretzels and some drinks. I was so hungry, and it killed me later. I didn’t have any idea about no plane change flight!! It’s okay. It was my lifelong experience.
And the first time, I was missing rice. I am from Bangladesh and have a habit of consuming rice once daily. Probably it affected my brain. Later, I consumed some food at a party, returned to the hotel, and slept, but later I vomited 4 times!! Later I emailed my co-ordinator that I couldn’t do my assigned volunteer job! Surprisingly, I arrived 30 min late, and I did another job.
Yes, that’s called love for volunteering work. I love my job.
During ICML – What were my activities?
During ICML – How were the conference Sessions?
Before Jul 19, I shorted out 38+ papers related to Federated learning or privacy and security of FL. I made a list where I noted room location, time, and other notes. Later, I rearranged the whole list according to time order. I started participating.
Poster Session: Basically poster session is a perfect scope for a young researcher. Because you can ask many questions to the presenter, I did that and gathered information that will help me in my following research.
I followed same rule for rest of the two days.
During ICML – How were the workshop Sessions?
Workshops were two days. I assumed that, oh, probably they would teach me something!! Yes, I assumed it. I didn’t have any idea, so I didn’t check every workshop. But after passing some hours, I was doing the right thing. Again I traced my field-oriented papers and participated in every talk. And I believe that my last two days were so amazing. I learned many new topics for my field.
After ICML – How was my solo traveling?
Yes, now it’s my turn! I started my solo traveling habit in 2019, although I started my traveling life in 2016. I made a list of historical places in Baltimore. It was an extensive list.
I started with Baltimore Basilica, which is America’s First Cathedral. It was just in front of my hotel, and I didn’t know till the last day. Then, for the first time, I visited any church, a historical 200 years old church. Next, I visited Washington Monument, Mount Vernon Place, Peabody Library, The Walters Art Museum, Maryland Center for History and Culture, Inner Harbor, Lexington Market, Bromo Seltzer Tower, Everyman Theatre, and Battle Monument. I visited all places free of cost! Even I used my student ID to enter Maryland Center for History and Culture. Almost I was walking 12 hours to cover all of these. Meantime, I finished my lunch and dinner.
Bottom Line
I think every graduate student should participate in this kind of conference. No matter if you don’t have any paper. I noticed that many students participated without publishing any paper, even from good schools. It’s no matter of prestige. It matters for learning new things.
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S M Sarwar Nobin
I am now pursuing my MS in Computer Science and working as a Graduate Research Assistant at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, Texas, USA. Besides my study, I also work as a Vice-chair at IEEE Corpus Christi Section, Alternate Member at UT System Student Advisory Council (UTRGV), Senator for the Graduate College at UTRGV Student Government Association (SGA), President at Collegiate Entrepreneurs Organization – Edinburg, Secretary at Engineers Without Borders UTRGV, and Reps at Mozilla.