Wondering why you should go to the annual meeting if you are not on the job market?

Attending annual meetings before your first interview gives intellectual, social, professional, and logistical advantages.
These meetings are complicated affairs, with the Job Register, sessions, receptions, and the exhibit hall. Attending a meeting before you plan to interview will help you get a sense of how things are organized and of the pace of events, which helps take some stress off when you do interview.

Attending annual meetings furthers your professional development. Every year, the AHA divisions and committees organize multiple sessions on professional concerns ranging from interviewing to teaching, publishing, and researching. Some of these are traditional sessions, and some are interactive workshops allowing you to air your own concerns. Attending panels on the profession is a great way to prepare for future interviews.

Receptions at the annual meeting are a blast. In addition to institutional receptions, make sure to check out the receptions for graduate students and minority historians. Munch on the free finger foods, catch up with old friends, and make some new ones.

The annual meeting is an opportunity to network and meet future colleagues. Attend sessions on your topics of interest and meet others working in the field. Attend panels that are tangentially related to your work and get innovative ideas that might help you conceptualize your own intellectual project. Take business cards and exchange them—this is a great way to start building your intellectual community outside your own particular institution. Take the time to meet the individuals with whom you can share your work, research tips and strategies, and organize future sessions.

Of particular interest:

Friday, January 7:

• Session 1: Interviewing in the Job Market in the Twenty-First Century (9:30–11:30 a.m. Sheraton, Metropolitan Ballroom)
  
• Session 30: The Job Hunt 2005 (2:30–4:30 p.m. Convention Center, Room 609)
  
• Committee for Graduate Students Open Forum (5:30–6:30 p.m. Convention Center, Room 204)
  
• Reception for Graduate Students (6:30 p.m. Sheraton, East Ballroom B)

Saturday, January 8:

• Session 62: The Education of Historians for the Twenty-First Century: What Does It Mean for Graduate Students? (9:30–11:30 a.m. Convention Center, Room 609)
  
• Session 89: Fellowship Funding for Graduate Students (2:30–4:30 p.m. Convention Center, Room 606)

– Myrna Ivonne Wallace Fuentes, PhD, Duke University, is the chair of the Committee for Graduate Students.