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Thank you for NEASIS&T, ASIS&T, and sponsors for selecting me as an annual ASIS&T conference scholarship award winner to attend the conference in Salt Lake City, Utah. As a first-time attendee, I had a wonderful experience and broadened my knowledge on latest trends and research in information science and technology. I attended more than twenty-five workshops, panels, keynote speakers’ sessions and poster presentations. I wish, I was able to attend in-person due to the pandemic situation, I attended all four days virtually and connected with many other peers who are passionate to do research and work related to information science and technology. Topics that I was interested were artificial intelligence, data science, analytics, visualization, information theory, privacy and ethics, and LIS profession related sessions.

Finding workshops to attend was a challenge as I wanted to attend most of them, few times I went to two sessions scheduled at the same time as the research topics were interesting to me and wanted to learn from both sessions. The great networking and volunteer opportunities are so valuable to my profession and research. There were many sessions that I was thrilled to join, two were “Artificial Intelligence in Information Research and Practice: Fostering Interconnected Communities (SIG-AI)” and “Antiracism in the LIS profession: not just lip service.” It was great to learn and make connections from these sessions. There were many networking opportunities from local, state, and global participants by attending this conference, it opened many opportunities to connect locally and internationally and to serve in my profession in the future. Thank you again for giving me this amazing experience, looking forward to exploring networking and collaboration opportunities with the NEASIS&T and ASIS&T members. Thank you, NEASIS&T, Louisa Choy, and William Lundmark, for supporting me each step of the way to attend the conference.

Rukmal Ryder

Reference Services, Childhood Education and Care Research and Instruction Librarian

Salem State University, Salem, Massachusetts