NSF Student Travel Grant for 2018 IEEE International Conference on Network Protocols (ICNP)

University Of Illinois At Chicago, Chicago IL

Investigators

Abstract

ICNP 2018, the 26th annual edition of the IEEE International Conference on Network Protocols, is a conference covering all aspects of network protocols, including design, analysis, specification, verification, implementation, and performance. This award supports partial travel costs for graduate students enrolled in United States academic institutions to attend the conference. Depending on fund availability, postdoctoral researchers and faculty members from underrepresented groups that are employed in US institutions will also be considered for travel support. ICNP 2018 will be held in Cambridge, UK, from September 24 through 27, 2018. This travel grant aims to broaden ICNP participation by lowering the financial barrier of attendance for graduate students at institutions in the Unites States. Enabling students to attend a high-quality conference at an early stage of a researcher's academic career is a wise investment in the future of the field. Providing opportunities for attendance to underrepresented students will result in a greater diversity of ideas that will be discussed during the conference. Research in network protocols is advanced by the interactions of participants at conferences such as ICNP. The travel support will have a significant impact in at least three ways. First, graduate students who would have been unable otherwise to attend ICNP will be greatly benefited by listening to the speaker's talks and participating in resulting discussions. Second, even the ICNP participants that will not receive the grant will be indirectly benefited by the presence of the grant recipients. Since the award committee will make an effort to select a diverse group of students, the demographics of the conference will become more diverse as well. Finally, the research community as a whole will be positively impacted by the continuing success of the ICNP. The participation of scholars at early stages of their careers, some of which come from underrepresented groups, will advance training and the quality of the next generation of research leaders in the field. 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.