ALGECOM (algebra-geometry-combinatorics) is a series of biannual one day conferences. The main goal is to promote collaboration and regular interaction among midwest students and faculty. Both (non-local) senior and early career mathematicians will be invited as speakers. ALGECOM is now a nearly decade-long tradition in the midwest and has involved over fifty institutions. This grant will fund participant travel to six conferences, the first of which, ALGECOM XVII, will be at Loyola University in Chicago on May 25, 2019. The conference website is at https://sites.google.com/site/algecomday/algecom-xvii.
Each session of ALGECOM consists of four talks and a student poster session. Dissemination of research at the border of algebra, geometry and combinatorics is the basic intellectual merit of the series. There is a wealth of midwest departments with individually small ALGECOM-related research groups. These one day conferences provide the seed for research collaboration among these groups. A major effort has been made to encourage the attendance of graduate students, recent graduates, and untenured faculty. In terms of broader impacts, there are ongoing efforts to recruit women as participants and speakers (in fact ALGECOM 14 had the first all women speaker list). These efforts are enhanced by NSF support, as it allows for invitations to mathematicians from a geographically larger region.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
