“Thank you for today, and thank you for opening this conference up to doc students beyond JHU. The sessions I attended provided some of the best mentoring I've had during my doctoral career. I'm an older (much) doctoral student, and I anticipated that today I'd feel out of the loop, sad, and a little bit like everyone's mom. Instead, I emerged from the final session seeing my previous couple of careers, my industry experience, and my maturity as critically important parts of my narrative, not a reason for apology.”