2011 School of Information

Theory Tie Liu & Sriram Vishwanath

On UT Austin campus

Memorial day weekend

Organizing Committee

General Chairs: Tie Liu and Sriram Vishwanath

Program Chairs: Robert Cui, Elza Erkip, Aaron Wagner

Local Arrangements: Jean Francois Chamberland, Henry Pfister

Publicity and Web: Matthieu Bloch

Advisors: Gerhard Kramer and Aylin Yener

5

Program Overview

May 27Friday

May 28Saturday

May 29Sunday

May 30Monday

Opening remarks

2X90min Lectures Emre Telatar

2X60min Lectures Sanjoy Mitter

2X90min Lectures Emina Soljanin

Student Presentations1:30-3:30pm

2X90min Lectures Robert Gray

Padovani LectureRich Baraniuk

Rudi and Alon Day

The IT Wiki9am-5 pm

Student Presentations

4-6 pm

Pool Party! Gregory Gym 6:45 pm

Student Presentations

4-6 pm

Group Photo+ Movie Night! 6:45 pm

Student Presentations

4-6 pm

Bowling Night! Texas Underground 6:45 pm

School Ended at 5 pm

Lecture materials available online at: www.itsoc.org/school

School NumbersTotal attendees = 122 (students + postdocs)

Total cancellations = 14 (mainly visa issues)

2010 we had 178 attendees

Bottom LineLate June – August better time for more attendees

But we should consider limiting registration to curb costs and to keep quality high

Disadvantage Advantage

Fewer people benefitted Budget more reasonableEasier logisticsBetter student-teacher ratio

BudgetIEEE IT Society = 25K

Army Research Office (ARO) = 15K

Texas A&M (5k), UT Austin (5K), Rice (2K), Princeton (0.5K)

NSF Science of Information Center = 2.6K

Total = 55K

We were able to support the School (including ITWiki day) thanks to these generous sponsors

More Thank you’s!

Sponsors: ITSoc BoG, Bob Ulman & Ananthram Swami, Brent Ladd (SoI center), Costas Georghiades, Behnaam Aazhang, Vince Poor, Jeff Andrews

The IT school organizing committee

Volunteers: Jubin Jose, Rajiv Soundararajan, Harpreet Dhillon, Abhik Das, Ioannis Mitliagkas, Hongbo Si, Zrinka Pulij, Aneesh Reddy

NotesDifference #1: IT school in May

Difference #2: Students provided credit card for dorm

Charged roughly 3 weeks prior to event

Many fewer cancellations than previous years

Much easier on the staff

Difference #3: Staff support minimal during event

Bad idea. Critical to have building and custodial staff present.