German SIAM Student Chapters Meet Algorithmic Optimization
24 July 2023
From July 24th to 26th the German SIAM chapters meet under the aegis of the workshop German SIAM Student Chapters Meet Algorithmic Optimization in Trier (also known as Trèves).
The trip started on Sunday with a lengthy, but picturesque, train ride all the way to Rhineland-Palatinate along the rivers Rhine and Mosel. The workshop itself started on Monday morning with an icebreaker game to get to know the other participants, as well as short presentations of the attending chapters. Then, the scientific program started with the first of four invited plenary talks. During the rest of the day, the junior researchers had the chance to give half-hour-long talks, including our chapter representative Henrik. In between, the coffee breaks and a joint lunch in the Mensa offered further great possibilities to get in touch with other people. The day ended with a combined welcome reception and poster session. Being provided with local wine, there was again plenty of room for scientific exchange. Walking back from the university on the hill to the hotel, one could get a nice view over the city of Trier.
The second day was again filled with scientific program. In particular, there were again two plenary talks leading up to presentations by junior researchers. However, that day ended a bit earlier (just like the rain) to do a guided city tour. This covered some of the main sights, such as the Porta Nigra, the Cathedral, and a statue of Karl Marx at his birthplace. After that, we went to the "Wirtshaus zur Glocke" for the conference dinner and a wine tasting in an old wine cellar. The latter covered six delicious wines from the Mosel-Saar region, ranging from dry riesling to sweet ice wine.
On Wednesday, we started the day a bit differently with an open discussion on best practices for SIAM chapters. Here, we gained insights from the work of other chapters and exchanged thoughts on upcoming events. After two more scientific talks, the last session was again a moderated discussion on the broad topic "PhD and Beyond". We covered aspects of academic and industrial careers, networking, publications, and more. These were, in particular, supplemented with valuable insights from the attending professors. The workshop ended with a final joint lunch in the mensa, and everybody returned in their own direction.
Finally, we would like to thank the SIAM Chapter Trier for their extraordinary organization and the opportunity to be a part of the program committee as well as their research training group ALOP for funding the workshop.