Early Career Tropical Meteorologist Supported by RMetS Legacies Fund

The RMetS Legacies Fund supports Society members through financing scientific activities. Recent recipient, Fran Morris, shares how the Legacies Fund aided her professional development after completing a PhD in tropical meteorology.

The American Meteorological Society’s 36th Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology took place in early May 2024. I submitted an abstract for the conference in December, unsure whether it would be feasible to attend the conference in person in Long Beach, California. I was lucky enough to receive funding from the Royal Meteorological Society’s Legacies Fund which enabled me to attend the conference in person. Having recently completed my PhD in tropical meteorology at the University of Leeds, attending in person was not only an incredible opportunity to share the work I had done over those final frantic months of writing up my thesis, but also to make connections with other scientists in the field to fuel future collaborations and learn about exciting new science.  

It was a pleasure to attend a conference with so many presentations relevant to my research interests, with sessions focusing on tropical convection, equatorial waves, convective parameterisations, and climate variability in the tropics. I found value in almost every talk I attended, and I have a folder full of detailed notes to prove it! Furthermore, I had the opportunity to witness some remarkably lively scientific debate at the end of presentations, with many scientists passionately discussing issues at the forefront of cutting-edge research.  

At the conference I had the opportunity to not only give a talk, but also present a poster. I was very lucky to receive lots of engagement with my poster, and I appreciated being able to discuss it in-person with other colleagues. By the end of the session, I was exhausted having talked almost non-stop for the past two hours and received some insightful feedback from researchers from a variety of different institutions. 

Attending in person also meant that I had the opportunity to have more detailed and in-depth discussions with other presenters about their work. During coffee and lunch breaks I was able to connect with leading researchers in my field and fellow early-career scientists – many of whom I plan to collaborate with. The conference provided early-career researchers with specific networking sessions, allowing me to build and strengthen relationships with international colleagues I would never have met otherwise, and even offered a fascinating panel on career development in tropical meteorology, with panellists from both academia and industry offering insights into their career journeys.  

I learned a huge amount from the conference and look forward to continuing to collaborate with colleagues I met at the meeting. I highly recommend to any early-career scientist to ensure that they are a member of the RMetS so that they can take advantage of the Legacies Fund to enjoy the experience of attending an international conference in their discipline!