[MATHLINK] MCLS2020 Closing Remarks and Mentorship Launch Event

[MCLS Trainee]

Dear MCLS Community,

Please excuse the long email. I got emotional and reflective, but there is
important information below. I've added a line break so you can skip this
first part if you so choose.

First, we would like to take a moment to thank and acknowledge everyone who
attended any of our online programming this year. We recognize this has
been a trying year for everyone and adding one more video meeting to your
weekly schedule has not been easy. Still, each live event had an average of
over 50 people which is better than your average symposium attendance at
most conferences! We're disappointed we have to continue to exist only
online for the upcoming year, but we hope to make this year's online
conference even better than the last and we cannot wait to see everyone in
person in Belgium in the summer of 2022! In order to ensure this upcoming
conference is the best it can be, we invite your feedback here:
*https://forms.gle/fn3QMjUcVSNGBRN47
<https://the-mcls.us20.list-manage.com/track/click?u=52a664da881817eed812437d0&id=96c86c689d&e=f13dd00558>*
.

I'm going to take a second to drop the "we" curtain and write as myself
(Andy) for a moment (hopefully my email privileges won't be revoked): When
Julia Bahnmuller, Bella Starling Alves, and I decided to take the reins
from the governing board and conference planning committee to transition
MCLS to an online conference rather than just skip a year or more, we had
no idea what we were taking on or getting ourselves into. Nor did the rest
of the training board (Ilse Coolen, Rebecca Merkley, Dana Miller-Cotto, and
Venera Gashaj) as they joined the team. We had no idea how much work was
going to go into this, nor did we know that we would be met with such
phenomenal support from the incredible community that is the Mathematical
Cognition and Learning Society. We had initially planned to launch an
occasional speaker series to keep discussion and dialogue open and promote
the interests of trainees between annual in-person meetings; instead, we
ended up with a full-blown conference that ran shockingly smoothly and with
surprisingly few hiccups given the fact that we were running to keep up
with the crazy timeline we set ourselves with infrastructure we were
building as we went along. Most importantly, we ended up with an
unparalleled community of scholars around the world now supporting each
other on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis in the form of new
collaborations, conference session attendance, several regular writing
groups, a Slack with over 200 people. I think I can speak for more than
just myself in saying that this supportive community has yielded new
friendships that transcend academic settings and I look forward to what
that means for the future of MCLS. I could not be prouder of the work that
we've done nor could I imagine a more wonderful academic society to
consider myself a part of.

------------------------------

Back to our regularly scheduled programming:

We are very excited to say that tomorrow at 11am EST / 4pm BST we are
launching our new mentoring program with our speed networking event. This
speed networking event will be an informal opportunity to socialise with
your fellow researchers in small breakout rooms. This is a great way to get
to know each other and find your 'match' to get you started on this
mentoring path.

If you want to join this speed networking event, it would be great if you
could let us know by filling out the google form below:

https://forms.gle/sACsKZBEDhY6mc5XA
<https://the-mcls.us20.list-manage.com/track/click?u=52a664da881817eed812437d0&id=6e1ad5cea0&e=f13dd00558>

Don't worry if you can't make it but you would still like to find a
mentor/mentee/buddy, we will still be able to couple you with a fitting
'match'.

------------------------------

Topic: MCLS Closing Remarks and Mentorship Launch Event
Time: Apr 27, 2021 11:00 AM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/2258337242?pwd=eVhxaXhuSm96dHFKSWRQL1hWMDJFZz09

Meeting ID: 225 833 7242
Passcode: MCLS2020b
------------------------------

A couple things to remember:

   - If you skipped the first part of the email, a reminder that we are
   soliciting feedback on this year's conference:
   https://forms.gle/fn3QMjUcVSNGBRN47
   <https://the-mcls.us20.list-manage.com/track/click?u=52a664da881817eed812437d0&id=037e31c28b&e=f13dd00558>
   .
   - Also wanted to remind everyone that the submission Qualtrics is open
   for the 2021 conference
   <https://the-mcls.us20.list-manage.com/track/click?u=52a664da881817eed812437d0&id=b164ce9841&e=f13dd00558>!
   The call for abstract can be found here
   <https://the-mcls.us20.list-manage.com/track/click?u=52a664da881817eed812437d0&id=890b428661&e=f13dd00558>
   .
      - We will have ongoing calls for lightning talks and posters
      throughout the year to be able to address up-to-the-minute
emerging science.
   - We are also still inviting reviewers for conference submissions at all
   levels. Volunteer to be a reviewer here
   <https://the-mcls.us20.list-manage.com/track/click?u=52a664da881817eed812437d0&id=f514f5828d&e=f13dd00558>
   .

Finally, be sure to attend our *first event of the 2021 program*!
*Thursday, July 15 (Time TBD)* - MCLS 2021 Launch Event

Thanks for a great conference!
Andy Ribner and The MCLS Training Board