# Presentation: 222543

## Amber Jenkins
Fermilab Graduate Student Association
Imperial College, London

- Fermilab Graduate Student Association
- Imperial College, London

- Annual Fermilab Users’ Meeting
- June 2, 2003

- 1

- GSA Report

***GSA***

## What is the Graduate Student Association (GSA)?

*The voice of the graduate students at Fermilab*
- GSA reps elected every year in October:
-     Amber Jenkins     (Imperial College, London)
-     Andy Haas           (University of Washington)
-     Martin Hennecke (Karlsruhe University)
-     Reid Mumford     (Johns Hopkins University)
- 	Jun Zhang            (Columbia University)

**D0**

**CDF**

**Astro-theory**

- 2

***GSA***

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## Our Mission

- To represent the needs of the grad students to the Lab
- To act as a liaison between students & Lab Directorate, experiments & UEC
- To continue the education of the graduate student population
- To organize social events for the younger physics community; encourage interactions between students from different areas

- 3

***GSA***

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## Important Issues

- Visas
- Medical insurance
- Childcare
- Bike path & taxi access at the Lab
- Future of HEP

***GSA***

- 4

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## Visas

- Post 9/11 security restrictions make life difficult for foreign scientists
- Significant problem: Foreigners make up > 30% of science & engineering doctorate-recipients in US
- Requirements for detailed personal info found intrusive
- Visa renewal can take many months – in the meantime research is disrupted
- Visa status in turn affects the Social Security Number, drivers’ licence, car insurance, banking...

***GSA***

- 5

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## Medical Insurance

- Crucial issue
- Affects those who can least afford to pay – i.e. grad students & foreign visitors
- Would like to see all students with *adequate* medical coverage
- Currently conducting Medical Insurance Survey 2003
- Working with URA, Benefits & insurance brokers  to try to improve situation

***GSA***

- 6

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## Washington DC Trip

- GSA accompanied UEC to Washington DC in March 2003
- Met with Senators & Representatives
- Lobby for increased funding for HEP
- Funding situation is critical: over the past 12 years, funding      by 25%. Certainly affects students making decisions about their future career.
- Important to represent perspective of young physicists in Washington

***GSA***

- 7

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## Other Issues

- Childcare – affects small proportion of _[ ](http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=4babygift.net/baby.jpg&imgrefurl=http://4babygift.net/&h=161&w=256&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dbaby%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26oe%3DUTF-8)__[ ](http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=4babygift.net/baby.jpg&imgrefurl=http://4babygift.net/&h=161&w=256&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dbaby%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26oe%3DUTF-8)_students, but for those affected it is a significant problem
- Bike Access at the Lab – for many years, campaigns to improve bike access at Fermilab
- Taxi Service – students who don’t have cars are dependent on Lab taxis and taxi service hours

***GSA***

- 8

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## Education

- “Status of the Lab” – Mike Witherell
- U-Dzero talks
- CDF grad student talks
- UTeV – organized by UEC
- Career Night - July 2003
-                          - very useful for students
-                              - speakers from Lab, universities, industry
-                              - advice & info about career options                                  		       available

***GSA***

- 9

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## Social Life...

- Hallowe’en Party 2002 – ~120 people partied in the barn, our resident DJ, fantastic costumes, pumpkin carving, apple-bobbing...
- Bingo Night – our very own Fermi bingo!
- LHC Symposium ’03 Party
- Pachanga season has begun!
- New Perspectives Party this week...

- 10

***GSA***

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## New Perspectives 2003

***GSA***

- June 3-5, 2003
- Annual student conference at Fermilab
- A great line-up....
**- 4** guest speakers
**- 6** posters
**- 16** student talks (D0, CDF, MINOS, MiniBooNE, Muon Project, Computing Division,  Beams Division, SDSS..)
- - **1** black-belt karate demonstration!!
- Come and hear about the physics that’s really being done!

- 11

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003

## Conclusions...

- Our job is to represent the grad student population at the Lab
- We can do this in big and small ways
- It is important, now more than ever, that younger physicists’ voices are heard
- To help us do a good job we strongly encourage people to get involved!
- We’ve had a lot of fun and there’s a lot more to come!!

***GSA***

- 12

- Amber Jenkins, GSA Report        Users' Meeting, June 2, 2003