2019 CAIMS Election
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It is time again for the CAIMS*SCMAI Annual Election. This year, there are four
positions on the Board of Directors to be filled: President-Elect, Treasurer,
and two Directors.

The term of our current President, Matt Davision, is complete this year. We
would like to thank Matt for his valuable service as President; he will
transit into his new role as the Past President. The vacancy will be filled
by a new member. There are two nominees for the position: Troy Day and
Rebecca Tyson. The candidate with the most votes will be elected for a
two-year term.

With a single nomination for Treasurer (David Iron, Dalhousie University),
no voting will be required. The candidate information on the election website
is for reference only. We thank Lucy Campbell for her incredible contribution
as Treasurer of CAIMS from 2014-2019.

Also, with two nominations for the two Director positions (Ion Bica, MacEwan
University and Frithjof Lutscher, University of Ottawa), no voting will be
required. The candidate information on the election website is for reference
only. We thank Jane Heffernan and Tony Ware for their valuable service.

In order to vote, you must be a CAIMS member by March 29, 2019.

You will receive an email invitation to vote shortly. In the email, you will
be given voting instruction. The voting period starts on March 18, Monday,
8am to April 5, Friday, 11:55pm (Eastern time). Candidate information is
available on the online ballot. If you have any questions regarding the
election process, please contact CAIMS Secretary, Justin Wan, at
secretary@caims.ca.

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Item 2
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CAIMS Annual Meeting Important Dates: Final reminder
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Dear CAIMS Members,

Welcome to this year’s CAIMS annual meeting! This is a friendly reminder that
the March 24, 2019 deadline is approaching fast.

1. early-bird registration. The registration discount is only available until
March 24.

2. application for PIMS travel support for students/postdocs affiliated with
PIMS universities.

3. submission of abstract and title for talks at the contributed or poster
session.

You can find all the information at the conference website:

https://caims.ca/annual-meetings-2/

Please contact the local conference organizers (using the email contact given
on the website) if you have any question. Thank you!

Weiran Sun
Manfred Trummer

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Item 3
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CAIMS Journal MSI Flyer
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Support the Society’s first ever journal, Mathematics in Science and Industry,
by helping us spread the word! A flyer in electronic format has been created
for the journal. There are two versions: a letter size and an A4 size for our
international friends. They work well on both colour, and black and white
printers.

If you are interested, please contact the co-Editor-in-Chief, Thomas Hillen,
who is also our President-Elect at thillen@ualberta.ca.

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Item 4
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AMMCS International Conference, Waterloo, Canada, Aug 2019
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This international conference will take place in Waterloo, Canada,
August 18-23, 2019 (http://ammcs.wlu.ca/). The AMMCS Conference Series aims at
promoting interdisciplinary research and collaboration involving mathematical,
computational and experimental sciences within a larger international
community, and highlighting recent advances in Applied Mathematics, Modeling
and Computational Science (AMMCS).You are invited to submit your abstract by
going directly to the submission page at http://ammcs.wlu.ca/submit-abstracts/
to one of our special sessions, minisymposia, or contributed sessions.

The Conference features distinguished plenary and semi-speakers, including Ed
Boyden (M.I.T.), Fioralba Cakoni (Rutgers University), Eric Cances (Ecole des
Ponts ParisTech), Matt Davison (Western University), George Em Karniadakis
(Brown University), Peter Kloeden (University of Tuebingen), Lisa Lix
(University of Manitoba), Deanna Needell (University of California), Ariel
Procaccia (Carnegie Mellon University), and William Thomson (University of
Rochester).

Refereed proceedings will be published by Springer. A number of prizes for
students and young researchers will be awarded at the Conference, including the
Kolmogorov-Wiener Prize. Travel scholarships for students are available on a
competitive basis.

Further details are at the conference website: http://ammcs.wlu.ca/
(contact us at ammcs@wlu.ca).

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Item 5
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NSERC Survey
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A request from the NSERC-Math-Stat Liaison group

This is a special plea to the mathematics and statistics communities. NSERC,
in its wisdom, has decided to evaluate its non-individual Discovery programs
(Institutes, sub-atomic physics, research ships, and the like) by what is
essentially a customer satisfaction poll. Leaving aside questions of
statistical accuracy, this certainly goes against the basic principles of
scientific evaluation, such as international peer review. These points were
made, to no avail. The result is that all the Canadian scientists who are
funded by NSERC, or who have applied recently, will receive a questionnaire. (A
version was received by some of us under the signature of “Benoit Gauthier”).
The relevant pieces for us are on the institutes.

The poll will be closing before the end of the month

While there is no official competition between disciplines for these resources,
in an indirect way there always is. We are asking you to respond to the
questionnaire, and in doing so, to take a few seconds to remember the
scientific activities you have participated in, the post-docs or students in
your department that the institutes have at least partially funded, the
colloquia or the summer schools that they organise, and perhaps also the extra
cash they have managed to extract from provincial governments or your
universities for mathematics and statistics. Also, perhaps, the international
presence they give to mathematics in Canada. In short, make an effort to
remember. Your answer, then, is of course your own…

There will also be a question about the math-stat long range plan (LRP), and
the allocation of funds that followed. They are asking about whether funds
should flow as a priority to individual grants or the institutes. A somewhat
leading question, asking people if they should receive more money or if it
should go to someone else; perhaps the context of there being no real increase
to our institutes in a dozen years, in spite of there being a major addition
(CANSSI) to the pool, should be borne in mind.

Une requête du comité de Liaison entre le CRSNG et la communauté en sciences
mathématiques

Par ce message, le comité de liaison demande l’aide des communautés
mathématiques et statistiques. Le CRSNG, dans sa sagesse, a décidé d’évaluer la
portion non distribuée en subventions individuelles de son programme de
subventions à la découverte, soit la portion couvrant les instituts, la
physique sous-atomique, etc. Le questionnaire proposé est essentiellement un
questionnaire de satisfaction de la clientèle. Même en mettant de côté les
questions de validité statistique, ceci va à l’encontre des principes de base
de l’évaluation scientifique, par exemple par un comité international de pairs.
Mais, le comité de liaison n’a pas réussi à faire valoir son point. En
conséquence, tous les chercheurs subventionnés pas le CRNSG ou qui ont soumis
une demande de subvention récemment recevront le questionnaire (probablement
envoyé sous la signature de Benoit Gauthier). La partie du questionnaire qui
est importante pour le comité de liaison est celle qui porte sur les instituts.

Le sondage fermera avant la fin du mois.

Bien qu’il n’y ait pas de compétition « officielle » entre les disciplines, en
pratique il y en a une déguisée. Nous vous demandons de répondre au
questionnaire et, ce faisant, de prendre quelques secondes pour vous rappeler
les activités scientifiques auxquelles vous avez participé, les étudiants ou
postdocs que votre département que les instituts ont partiellement financé, les
colloques, écoles d’été et ateliers qu’ils organisent, ainsi que l’argent des
gouvernements provinciaux ou des universités que leur présence amène pour les
mathématiques et la statistique, sans oublier la visibilité internationale
qu’ils donnent aux sciences mathématiques au Canada. Vos réponses, bien sûr,
vous appartiennent.

Le questionnaire comprend aussi une question sur le “math-stat long range plan
(LRP)” et l’allocation des fonds qui a suivi. La question demande si ces fonds
doivent aller en priorité aux subventions individuelles ou aux instituts. La
question est en peu perverse lorsqu’on demande aux chercheurs s’ils préfèrent
plus d’argent pour eux ou pour les autres… Comme élément de contexte pour
vous aider à répondre, dans les douze dernières années il n’y a pas eu
d’augmentation de l’enveloppe des instituts, en dépit du fait qu’il y a
maintenant un institut de plus, l’INCASS, pour partager la même enveloppe
globale.

Merci d’avance de prendre de temps de répondre.

Le comité de liaison

CAIMS*SCMAI E–News Information

CAIMS*SCMAI E–News is distributed electronically several times a year by the Canadian Applied and Industrial Mathematics Society * Société Canadienne de Mathématiques Appliquées et Industrielles (http://www.caims.ca).

Past issues are available on the web at http://www.caims.ca/content/e–news-archive

Submissions are welcome and should be sent in plain text format to:

Justin Wan, CAIMS*SCMAI Secretary Email: secretary@caims.ca

The views expressed herein do not necessarily represent those of the Board or Membership of CAIMS*SCMAI. The editorial policy of this publication is to encourage the discussion of issues and facilitate the dissemination of information relevant to Canadian applied and industrial mathematics.

If you wish to have your name removed from the e-mailing list for the CAIMS*SCMAI E–News, please send an email message to Justin Wan as above.