In August 1988 a small Workshop of approximately twenty women researchers was held immediately prior to the Annual Meeting of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics and its Special Symposium on Probability and its Applications. Encouraged by the enormous success of this first Workshop, one has been run in subsequent years prior to the major joint annual meeting of American Statistical Association, regions of the International Biometric Society and the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, except that in 1994 it ran in conjunction with the World Congress of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics and the Bernoulli Section of the International Statistical Institute and in 2000 it ran in conjunction with the International Biometric Conference in Berkeley. The Workshops have been a huge success with laudatory thanks proferred each time. The need for such avenues for young researchers is still present. Therefore, this proposal is for a similar Workshop to be held in 2004 to be targeted at newly graduating young researchers who have not as yet had the opportunity to participate.
The Workshop is proposed to assist young women researchers in probability and statistics who have received their doctorates in the last five years. A senior researcher will give a major presentation on what where and how to ensure a successful and productive research career. Another senior will give a presentation on publishing - where and what to publish and how to write up research results. A third senior researcher will give a presentation on grant opportunities and how to pursue them. Workshop participants would give a brief presentation of their research interests and research environment. The opportunity to meet and interact with each other as well as a few established researchers will be invaluable as the participants learn to promote their own research and to decrease their professional isolation. As a result of the Workshop, attendees should be more successful in their own research careers, and thus, for example, survive the promotion and tenure process so that these women become role models for the students at all levels (undergraduate and graduate) in their own training programs.
