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Regular version of the site

Faculty of Computer Science Student about his Trip to University of California

From October 28th to November 16th, 2014, Nikita Alexandrov, 2nd-year student of Applied Mathematics and Information Science, participated in a research workshop on combinatorial geometry supervised by Igor Pak, professor at UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles) Mathematics Department. Nikita spoke on ‘Borsuk‘s Hypothesis and Related Tasks’.

Faculty of Computer Science Student about his Trip to University of California

Nikita shared his impressions about life, education, and people in America:

‘I’m happy that I had the opportunity to speak at Professor Pak’s research workshop. I certainly got some very useful experience of academic speaking, spoken English, and simply communicating with other people in an international context.

I’d been a little worried before the presentation, since in addition to the speech I had been expecting questions from the student audience. And I was afraid I would have some difficulty in understanding the questions. But I was lucky and managed to survive!

In addition to speaking at the workshop, I attended other lectures and a seminar, which I really enjoyed! The atmosphere at these lectures and seminars was relaxed, and some lecturers order pizza and beverages. They also joked during the presentations, and this led to an informal atmosphere allowing the participants ask more questions and participate in a more active discussion.

I was warmly welcomed to Los Angeles, and the university campus. Everyone was friendly and happy to help me adjust to this new environment. I am especially grateful for the support and explanations from those graduate students who graduated in Russia and are continuing their studies in the United States. Of course, I also talked a lot to American students, as well as ordinary residents. This society is very multiethnic, and you can meet people from any country.

I believe that this trip has been very useful for me, I got some important impressions on how life and the educational process can be organized, as well as the experience of communicating and interacting with very different people’.