What's a conference?
Research conferences vary widely. They are often categorized in part by the geographic region from which they aim to recruit participants, e.g. regional, national, international. Typically they have a "program" (or "technical program") which is the term used for the part of the conference schedule that involves presentations of the accepted authors' research. Usually the technical program is for some set of academic disciplines or fields of research. Different conferences aim for different amounts of participation from students of different academic stages, researchers, industry members, and community members. Conferences are a great place to meet others in a field from the previous, same, and later stages of their careers and learn about their experiences and their scholarship.