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SUPPORT & SPONSORS

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Academic Sponsors

The Benefits of Academic Sponsorship

Committee of Academic Sponsors
Summer Graduate Programs
MSRI/Network Conferences
Visits by MSRI Members
Access to Streaming Video Archive
Additional Benefits
Becoming an Academic Sponsor

MSRI's academic sponsors provide an interface between MSRI and the mathematical community. The Academic Sponsors participate in MSRI governance and take part (at Institute expense) in a general meeting with the other sponsors and trustees each year for this purpose. MSRI helps support visits by members to sponsoring institutions. Sponsors are offered some financial backing of conferences at sponsoring institutions. Perhaps most important: each Academic Sponsor can send 2-3 graduate students to MSRI summer programs each year at the Institute's expense.

MSRI was founded in 1982 by a consortium of nine West Coast institutions, which constituted the original group of Academic Sponsors. As the level of activity and success of MSRI has grown, so has the group of Academic Sponsors. In keeping with its role as a national and international institute and its mission as a center for the mathematical community, MSRI encourages sponsorship of academic institutions involved in mathematical research throughout North America and the world. Today there are 79 Academic Sponsors coming from around the US and from abroad. Here is a list of current MSRI Academic Sponsors.

Here is a more detailed description of the program as it stands in Spring 2005. We are continually working with the Committee of Academic Sponsors to explore new ways that MSRI can serve the community, and we expect this to evolve accordingly in the future.

Committe of Academic Sponsors

This committee consists of a representative from each Sponsoring Institution. The committee meets at MSRI each March; travel expenses and per diem are provided by MSRI. The Sponsors hear reports on the Institute’s current scientific programs and provide advice to MSRI on future plans and initiatives. There are often discussions of issues facing the broader mathematical community as well. This meeting is held just before the annual meeting of the MSRI Board of Trustees and the Sponsors join with the Trustees for a banquet and socializing.

Summer Graduate Program

Every summer MSRI organizes several summer graduate workshops (usually two weeks each), most of which are held at MSRI. Attending one of these workshops can be a very motivating and exciting experience for a student: participants have often said that it was the first experience where they felt like real mathematicians, interacting with other students and mathematicians in their field. Each sponsoring institution is invited to send two students (in total) to participate in these programs, and can send a third if the group includes a woman or a member of an under-represented minority. MSRI covers the travel and local expenses of the students.

The procedure is as follows: MSRI’s deputy director informs the Sponsor's Representative and the Director of Graduate Studies of the available Summer Graduate Programs for the following year. The Director of Graduate Studies submits nominations of students for particular programs. If the chosen program is already full, the Sponsoring Institution may make additional nominations to other programs until its quota of two or three accepted participants is reached.

MSRI/Network Conferences

[As of February 1, 2007 this program has been suspended by the Scientific Advisory Committee.]

Academic Sponsors may apply for funding for workshops to be held in subsequent years. MSRI’s Scientific Advisory Committee considers these applications at its January meeting, so applications must be received by December for funding in the following fiscal year (8/1--7/31). Although one-time conferences are considered, priority is given to applications for support of recurring regional topical conferences. Academic Sponsors may apply for funding up to $2,000/year for up to three years. If two or more Academic Sponsors jointly submit a proposal, then the request can be for up to $3,000/year for up to three years. Some preference is given to series of events in which more than one Academic Sponsor participates, and to Sponsors who did not receive funding during the previous fiscal year (August 1 to July 31). Proposals from consortia of institutions, not all of which are Academic Sponsors, are welcome, provided at least one of the institutions is an Academic Sponsor.

For a list of current MSRI/Network Conferences, go to http://www.msri.org/calendar/conference/

Applications should contain: the name of the workshop; its general mathematical aim; a brief history of the workshop if it has been held before; the sponsoring institutions involved; the amount of the request; an overall budget for the event; a list of the organizing committee and a tentative list of speakers (at least for the first event of the series).

Awardees must agree to submit a brief final report, and to mention in all advertising and on any conference web sites that the workshop is an MSRI-Network Conference.

Proposals are to be submitted by e-mail to mnc (please add @msri.org) or by regular mail to:

Deputy Director
Mathematical Sciences Research Institute
17 Gauss Way
Berkeley, CA 94720-5070

Visits by MSRI Members

Academic Sponsors are encouraged to invite MSRI members to visit and give a colloquium or seminar talk at the Sponsors’ institutions. MSRI provides partial support for the member’s visit (at present, up to $250).

Access to Streaming Video Archive

In October 1997, MSRI made public its streaming-video archive. As of Spring 2001, there were over 2,000 lectures available, making this the largest mathematical video archive in the world. Lecture notes or transparencies are available separately, making it possible to follow the lectures in detail and the user can pause or skip backwards or forwards. Users can download the lectures to form a local library of selected lectures for convenient viewing, for example with a class or seminar.

Our goal is to implement practical methods of Internet communication in order to make the mathematical activities of MSRI nationally and internationally available, and to help our sponsors, other mathematics departments and national centers profit from our experience to do the same. Each week, new streaming-video lectures are made available from this library and from current events at the Institute. Further information about the MSRI streaming-video archive is available at MSRI's web site.

Additional Benefits

From time to time, MSRI holds events that are of general interest to the mathematical community. Academic Sponsors are invited to send representatives, funded by MSRI. Academic Sponsors receive free subscriptions to the MSRI Book Series.

Becoming an Academic Sponsor

The exchange of ideas resulting from sponsorship benefits the Academic Sponsors, benefits MSRI, and benefits the entire mathematical community. In principle an Academic Sponsor is an academic department in the mathematical sciences; however, it may be any organization with interest in research in the mathematical sciences. The cost of Academic Sponsorship is $4000/year, invoiced in the month of August preceding the year of sponsorship. This fee is modest compared to the benefits of sponsorship and compared to our annual operating budget. However, the fund generated by sponsors' fees is critical in preserving ownership of MSRI by the mathematical community and in helping MSRI to maintain flexibility, stability, and independence.

Academic Sponsors are elected by MSRI’s Steering Committee. Interested organizations should send a letter (email will do) to the Director at MSRI. Upon acceptance by SAC, the organization becomes an academic sponsor and will be invoiced for that year’s dues. Further questions and inquiries are welcome, and we will be happy to send additional material on current and forthcoming programs.