This award will support the selection and attendance of eight U. S. graduate students and postdoctoral researchers at the 2014 Heidelberg Laureate Forum (HLF) in Heidelberg, Germany on September 21-26, 2014. The HLF brings together Laureates of the most prestigious awards in mathematics and computer science (the Abel Prize, the Fields Medal, the Turing Award, and the Rolf Nevanlinna Prize) to spend a week interacting with 200 early career researchers from all over the world. This award allows early career researchers from the U.S. to participate in this valuable international activity. In addition to the scientific exchanges with the Laureates and each other, young researchers at the Forum gain a valuable global perspective on the mathematical and computer sciences.
The HLF provides graduate students and postdoctoral researchers extraordinary access to a group of scientific role models through lectures, small group discussions, and casual conversations. Such experiences can have a profound impact on the development of an early career researcher. Oak Ridge Associated Universities will recruit a highly qualified and diverse applicant pool for the Forum. This award is jointly funded by the Division of Mathematical Sciences and Office of Multidisciplinary Activities within NSF's Directorate for Mathematical and Physical Sciences.
Forum web site: www.heidelberg-laureate-forum.org/
Supporting students to attend the Heidelberg Laureate Forum (HLF) enabled a delegation of the future of American mathematics to interact with Laureates of prestigious mathematical awards and other graduate students of high caliber from all around the world. Participation in the HLF gave these early career researchers an opportunity for interaction that is not available within the normal university environment by providing formal plenary lectures given by Laureates as well as small group discussions led by Laureates, where the topics are driven by student questions. The Forum offered opportunities to form new research collaborations with student counterparts from around the world. Participants in the Forum gained a valuable global perspective on their discipline that prepares them for leadership in that global community. The applications for the forum were solicited strategically to encourage graduate students form institutions that provide little or no opportunity to interact with the Laureates of the major prizes in the mathematical sciences, as well as a group of students broadly inclusive with regards to gender and race. To ensure that the supported graduate students were able to maximize the experience, this award provided travel expenses and fees to attend the forum. Programming was created to provide an orientation on the meeting for the American graduate students so that they could maximize the experience. In addition, this award allowed for the coordination effort with the forum organizers to arrange for assistence with meeting logistics, student housing and assistance with travel planning. The HLF was a wonderful opportunity for these young researchers. At the supported meeting, American graduate students in mathematical sciences were among 200 selected from a very competitive pool of over 800 applicants. The forum attendees represented 59 countries and six continents. Following the meeting, the participants were surveyed on their experiences in order to gather short-term data regarding the impact of the forum. The results indicate that in a significant numbers, the participants had a largely positive experience, were able to interact with the laureates in a substantial way, with some even having their current research shaped in some way by the interaction with the laureates.
