This project provides student travel support for the IEEE International Conference on Network Protocols (ICNP)held in Austin, TX on Oct 30 to Nov 2, 2012. The project allows a selected set of US students interested in network protocols to travel to this conference and benefit from the talks and other events. ICNP is a premier conference in this area and exposure to students of cutting edge research is essential.
The goal of this proposal was to broaden the audience attending the premier network protocol conference, the IEEE International Conference on Network Protocols (ICNP), and as a result, raise the level of interaction and the potential for new collaborations, new investigations, and higher quality research. Support from the National Science Foundation was requested on behalf of graduate students attending institutions in the United States. By supporting twelve (12) graduate students to attend ICNP 2012, this award increased the dissemination of the conference research results to a larger and a more diverse audience, which otherwise would not have been able to attend. In so doing, this grant contributed to the strength and inclusiveness of the research community, and lead to the long-term health and vitalization of ICNP. In addition, by giving preference in grant awards to women and under-represented students, this award increased the participation among these groups. Conference attendance is a crucial part of the life of a researcher. By creating new opportunities for students–especially those from under-represented groups–to attend a high-quality conference, this project benefited the research community in several ways. The students themselves beneftied from the opportunity to meet and interact with many other researchers in a favorable setting, and from seeing research presented that may be related to what they are working on, or may inspire them to try a new direction. The research community benefited from the improvement of the students in the pipeline, and the introduction of new researcher perspectives. Additionally, everybody benefited from increased diversity of participants attending the conference.
