Message from the Dean

Dear students,

Welcome to AY 2023-2024! As we gear up for the new academic year, I’d like to highlight some recent successes and express my gratitude to all of you for your hard work.

At this year’s graduation ceremony in June, the first with new President Martin Hetzer, we honored 27 PhD graduates and 2 MS graduates. Rishabh Sahu and Morris Brooks received the Outstanding PhD Award, and Alexander Kolesnikov (now at Google Research Zurich) received the ISTA Alumni Award. We are very proud of all of you and wish you the very best for your future. We hope that you will stay in touch with both us and with each other, and that you will look back fondly on your days at ISTA.

In August, this year’s ISTerns presented their research experiences at the ISTernship poster session, which provided another opportunity for the community to come together. A big thank you to all the faculty, postdocs, and students who welcomed ISTerns into their groups and mentored them for the summer.

On Friday, 15th of September, 66 new students  will be joining us as part of the 2023 cohort! Please join me in extending a warm welcome and including them in our community from the start. Thanks to those of you presenting posters and social activities at the Welcome Day, the first-year buddies, and all the other student volunteers who contribute to making our welcome a success.

The annual Open Graduate School meeting is coming up on 20th of October, 1 pm, Raiffeisen Lecture Hall. At this meeting we will share developments made over the last year and welcome your suggestions for changes or issues you would like to see addressed. We hope that many of you can make it!

Wishing you a wonderful start to the new year,

Eva Benkova, Dean