Newsletter for 10/04/2020

New Announcements

Announcements

*PLEASE NOTE THE UPCOMING UNIVERSITY DEADLINES*

Please note the following upcoming university deadlines, and ALWAYS check the Academic and Administrative Calendar for important dates and deadlines. Bookmark this year's Academic and Administrative Calendar and refer to it regularly.

Friday, October 9th Graduate Student Enrollment & Fee Payment

If you have not paid your registration fees or enrolled in the minimum number of courses by this date, you will be charged a $50 late fee.  Please keep in mind that pending aid (Fellowship, GSR, TA) will not credit your account until you are enrolled in at least 5 units. 

Friday, October 9th Graduate Student Part-Time Status

This is the deadline to apply for reduced course load and fees.  Part-time status forms must be approved/signed by your faculty advisor and submitted to the BSOE Graduate Advising office by the posted deadline.  Part-time application forms are available on the Graduate Division's website.

Thursday, October 15th Deadline To Apply For Degree
If you plan to complete your MS or PhD this quarter (Fall 2020), the degree application needs to be submitted to BSOE Graduate Advising office. This is also the deadline to pay for filing fee, if applicable. More guidelines for graduating are available on the Graduate Advising website.

Wednesday, October 21st Deadline to Add/Drop/Swap Courses
This is your last day to add, drop and swap courses.  You will not be able to drop or withdraw from courses after this deadline has passed. If you are enrolled in a placeholder class, you MUST drop it by this deadline. More information on how to add, drop, and swap classes is available on the registrar website.

Wednesday, October 21st Grade Option
This is your last day to change your grading option for any courses you are enrolled in.

IMPORTANT: The system defaults to Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory grading.  Instructions for how to change your grading option to letter grades (ABC) can be found here.

Thursday, November 12th Late Add with Fee Deadline

The Add by Petition form requires the signatures of both the instructor and the department adviser and needs to be submitted to the Office of the Registrar.

Resources for Remote/Online Teaching - For Graduate Students

STEM Scholarship and Fellowship Deadlines | PathwaysToScience.org

Although it may seem early, fellowship deadlines are right around the corner – with many deadlines in October and early November for funding for the 2021/2022 academic year. Below are links to our database of STEM funding opportunities.

Graduate fellowships and tips on applying: https://pathwaystoscience.org/Grad.aspx                                                                    

Video tutorial on how to use our advanced search page: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxKsAGk8dAw&t=16s

If you have questions, I’d be happy to help. Please email me at ldetrick@ibparticipation.org

STEM Solutions in Public Policy Award

UC Center Sacramento is pleased to announce the STEM Solutions in Public Policy Award.

This award will recognize one or more outstanding proposals for new California legislation from UC STEM graduate students. The winner(s) will receive $1,000 for research support and -- should their bill advance through the legislative process –travel expenses covering a trip to Sacramento to convene with Legislators and/or legislative staff.

Submissions will be accepted until midnight Pacific time on October 23^rd, 2020 and applicants will be notified of their status in March 2021. Further information is available at UCCS STEM Solutions or on the UCCS website (uccs.ucdavis.edu).

UCSC Career Success 2020-2021

Career Success is excited to announce our academic year plan! 

We are grouping events and support for students into six Industry Clusters! Our fairs, events and outreach will correlate to these groups:

• Arts, Entertainment, & Media
• Business & Financial Services
• Education, Legal & Human Services
• Environmental, Biotech & Life Sciences
• Health 
• Computer Science, Engineering & Information Management  

Banana slugs will be able to opt-in to a newsletter(s) pertaining to their area(s) of interest and will receive communication about upcoming events, job postings, and helpful resources! Stay tuned for the link to the newsletter sign up.

1. Fall Quarter Poster (summarizing our services for Fall) 
2. Academic Year Infographic (summarizing our services for the year) 

Students can access our upcoming events on the Career Success student event calendar or Handshake! We are excited to partner with Handshake to host our virtual career fairs. We will send students information on how to plan and prepare, but we will need your support in spreading the word. 

For students who need help with job applications, we are now offering written resume and cover letter feedback! Click here for more information: https://careers.ucsc.edu/student/coaching/drop-in-advising.html

If you are hosting a program related to career development and would like it to be featured in our weekly newsletter, please submit the information here.

Thank you. 

UCSC Career Success

Slug Support Pantry Fall Hours

Graduate students will have access during all the open hours. The Basic Needs team has designated grad only pantry hours specifically on Tuesdays 3:45 - 6:00 pm. Grads should enter via the patio so that we can keep the front door of the coffee shop closed to avoid other students trickling in. 
 

Insight Fellows Program - Upcoming Webinars: Transitioning to Careers in Data and Tech

Interested in a career in data science, engineering, machine learning, or other tech roles? Insight Fellows Program is hosting a series of webinars to help you learn more about the landscape, the kinds of careers that are available, and guidance to help you make the transition. Sign up for one or more of these webinars below! 

Webinar 1: Careers in Distributed Computing

Join to discuss the rapid growth and demand for engineers in DevOps and Blockchain. We will chat about tips and next steps for transitioning into the industries. All backgrounds and experience levels are welcome!

Date: Wednesday, October 7th

Time: 3pm PT / 6pm ET

Sign Up Now

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Webinar 2: Transitioning from Academia to Industry

This session will cover the current state of the data science landscape, what kinds of careers are available, and how to leverage your experience in academia to help bridge the gap to industry.

Date: Wednesday, October 7th

Time: 5pm PT / 8pm ET

Sign Up Now

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Webinar 3: Careers in Data Science

Scientists from diverse fields, including physics, ecology, engineering, neuroscience, math, sociology, geosciences, statistics, computer science, and more, are playing key roles in transforming the way companies and public institutions work with data to impact our daily lives. Join this session for a high-level overview of the data science industry, how each field gives Fellows their own unique edge in the DS job market, and discussion of the Insight Fellows Program.

Date: Thursday, October 8th

Time: 11am PT / 2pm ET

Sign Up Now

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Webinar 4: Careers in Data Engineering

What exactly is data engineering, and how can I leverage my software engineering background to get into the world of Big Data? In this session, we’ll discuss whether this rapidly growing field suits your skills and career goals and how Insight's Data Engineering Fellowship Program can help you make the transition.

Date: Thursday, October 8th

Time: 4pm PT / 7pm ET

Sign Up Now

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Webinar 5: Transitioning to a Career in Artificial Intelligence

Join this session for an overview of the artificial intelligence landscape, as well as advice on transitioning into roles in AI. This session is designed for beginners interested in transitioning into deep learning and machine learning engineering roles.

Date: Thursday, October 15th

Time: 2pm PT / 5pm ET

Sign Up Now

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Interested in attending, but can’t make the time? Sign up to receive information about future sessions: https://notify.insightdatascience.com/notify

Interested in learning more about Insight and our programs? Visit: https://www.insightfellows.com

eBay's Machine Learning Competition for Students

For the second year, eBay is running a ML Challenge. The prize of the competition is an internship at eBay for the winning student or team.

The announcement attached describes the competition in more detail, but in a nutshell:

The question we invite you to address is how to identify two or more listings as being for the same product by putting them into the same group. We call this Purchase Level Equivalency (PLE). That is, if a buyer purchased two items from two different listings in a single group, they would assess that they had obtained two instances of the same product.

The competition started August 24. It is being hosted on EvalAI.

Please feel free to ask any questions. We have set up a mailbox dedicated to this competition at MLChallenge@ebay.com.

Global and Community Health Wellbeing Awards

The UCSC Division of Social Sciences Global and Community Health (GCH) Wellbeing Awards program enables undergraduate and graduate students to complete a research project that addresses Global and Community Health in collaboration with a community organization. The program is offered through the Institute for Social Transformation, who supports and facilitates the wellbeing awards. 

Global and Community Health constitutes an urgent area of research, study, and practice. Our interdisciplinary program prioritizes the improvement of health and well-being in communities worldwide. Building upon collaborations across departments, divisions and the community here in Santa Cruz, we seek to address forces affecting health outcomes that range from the molecular, ecological and genomic to the global, political and economic. Ultimately our goal is to support the sustainability of communities and climates for health both locally and globally, doing so in ways that cultivate a new generation of global and community health leaders.

Please, direct questions to Nancy Chen nchen@ucsc.edu or the Institute for Social Transformation at transform@ucsc.edu. 

Please visit this website for more information.

Deadline is October 30, 2020

Up to 10 awards of up to $1,000 each will be awarded.

Application:

Eligibility: Funding is offered to highly motivated undergraduate and graduate students currently enrolled through Spring 2021 and in good standing at UC Santa Cruz. Funded students must participate in a public or virtual event highlighting their work. We encourage all students at UCSC to apply, but undergraduates in the Social Sciences will be prioritized. During COVID-19 restrictions all research projects will need to be conducted in a manner that is safe and consistent with current guidelines.

Award: Student awards are limited to a maximum of $1,000 for community-based research during the academic year 2020-21. If students are applying for a group project, the award will be shared amongst the group members. The award is paid as a fellowship to help cover expenses such as: mileage, food, research supplies, data collection, equipment, software, hardware, survey incentives, etc.

Information Workshop: An information session will be offered on Wednesday, October 14, 12-1 PM.

Jobs

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Tracks at Sea Challenge

Announcing the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Tracks at Sea Challenge conducted by the Naval Information Warfare Center Pacific (NIWC PAC) and the Naval Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) Coordination Office, managed by the Office of Naval Research (ONR). 

The goal of this challenge is to engage with the workforce of tomorrow on relevant Naval problems. The need here is to augment unmanned surface vehicles’ (USVs’) maritime contact tracking capability.  The technology developed for this prize challenge will solve this problem by developing a computer vision system that will plot the tracks of shipping traffic exclusively using the passive sensing capability of onboard cameras. This technology would also be applicable for the Navy to document vessels performing unsafe navigation on the high seas.

NIWC PAC has established $200,000 as the total amount set aside for cash prizes under this challenge. Prizes will be awarded for the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th places in the amounts of $55,000, $45,000, $35,000, $30,000, $20,000, $10,000, and $5000 respectively. Prizes will be disbursed to the respective teams’ department, college, laboratory, or other eligible university component as specified by the consensus of the team.

The challenge kicks off on Oct. 1 and is open to students at accredited higher education institutions.

For more information, please visit the following link: https://www.challenge.gov/challenge/AI-tracks-at-sea/

DOE Office of Science Graduate Student Research (SCGSR) Program accepting applications

The Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Science is pleased to announce that the Office of Science Graduate Student Research (SCGSR) program is now accepting applications for the 2020 Solicitation 2.  Applications are due 5:00pm Eastern Time on Thursday, November 12, 2020. 

We would like to bring to your attention 4 new transdisciplinary research areas for encouraging graduate training activities at the convergence of multiple disciplines and communities, including Microelectronics, Data Science, Conservation Laws and Symmetries, and Accelerator Science. We strongly encourage applications in these areas.  Detailed information about the program, including eligibility requirements and access to the online application system, can be found at: https://science.osti.gov/wdts/scgsr/.  

The SCGSR program supports supplemental awards to outstanding U.S. graduate students to conduct part of their graduate thesis research at a DOE national laboratory/facility in collaboration with a DOE laboratory scientist for a period of 3 to 12 consecutive months—with the goal of preparing graduate students for scientific and technical careers critically important to the DOE Office of Science mission.

The SCGSR program is open to current Ph.D. students in qualified graduate programs at accredited U.S. academic institutions, who are conducting their graduate thesis research in targeted areas of importance to the DOE Office of Science. The research opportunity is expected to advance the graduate students’ overall doctoral thesis/dissertation while providing access to the expertise, resources, and capabilities available at the host DOE laboratories/facilities. The supplemental award provides for additional, incremental costs for living and travel expenses directly associated with conducting the SCGSR research project at the DOE host laboratory/facility during the award period.

The Office of Science expects to make approximately 95 awards in 2020 Solicitation 2 cycle, for project periods beginning anytime between June 14, 2021 and October 4, 2021. 

Since its inception in 2014, the SCGSR program has provided support to over 580 graduate awardees from 141 different U.S. universities to conduct thesis research at 18 DOE national laboratories/facilities across the nation.

The SCGSR program is sponsored and managed by the DOE Office of Science’s Office of Workforce Development for Teachers and Scientists (WDTS), in collaboration with the six Office of Science research programs offices and the DOE national laboratories/facilities, and program administration support is provided by the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE).

For any questions, please contact the SCGSR Program Manager, Dr. Ping Ge, at sc.scgsr@science.doe.gov.