Women+ and Mathematics Program (W+AM) at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) Receives 2023 AWM Presidential Recognition Award

The 2023 AWM Presidential Recognition Award is given to the Women+ and Mathematics Program (W+AM) at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS).

Citation. Founded by Karen Uhlenbeck and Chuu-Lian Terng in 1993 as part of the Park City Mathematics Institute, the Women+ and Mathematics Program was established at the Institute for Advanced Study in 1994. To date, the program has welcomed more than 1,650 participants, resulting in a powerful network of women mathematicians. The Association for Women+ in Mathematics honors W+AM with the AWM Presidential Recognition Award for its 30-year record of celebrating excellent mathematics and for fostering exceptional community citizenship.

W+AM is an annual program with the mission to recruit and retain more women in mathematics. W+AM aims to counter the initial imbalance in the numbers of men and women entering mathematics training as well as the higher attrition rate of female mathematicians compared to their male counterparts at every critical transition stage in mathematical careers. W+AM encourages female mathematicians to form collaborative research relationships and become active in a vertical mentoring network spanning a continuum from undergraduates to emerita professors. This provides support and reduces the sense of isolation experienced by many women in mathematics. While there are a number of women’s programs targeted solely at undergraduates, graduate students, or postdocs, very few programs provide the depth and breadth that come from simultaneously including features tailored for undergraduate students, graduate students, and researchers from a broad spectrum of US institutions, all in one united community of scholars, as W+AM does.

The core W+AM curriculum includes an intensive multi-day workshop on the IAS campus, which features lectures, seminars, and working sessions on a selected topic. Beyond the core, participants are encouraged to organize evening programs around topics that are of current interest or relevant to their career development. Interested participants also have the opportunity to perform local outreach. W+AM alumnae have won numerous accolades, including many AWM prizes and awards. The benefit of this program to the mathematical sciences community, and specifically to the AWM, can be measured by the number of volunteers, leaders, program organizers, and supporters who have been impacted by the W+AM program and have, in turn, enriched our community with their contributions.

Response from Women and Mathematics Program:

We are honored that the AWM selected the Women+ and Mathematics Program at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) for the 2023 AWM Presidential Recognition Award. We are very grateful for the support of AWM, the mathematical community, and the IAS, as well as the sponsors, including Lisa Simonyi, the Minerva Research Foundation, the National Science Foundation, and the Princeton University Department of Mathematics. Thank you also to the enormous group of people who have made this program possible over the years: the founders (Chuu-Lian Terng and Karen Uhlenbeck), the committee members and organizers, the lecturers and seminar speakers, the panelists and other volunteers, the IAS faculty and staff, and the participants themselves! We hope that many mathematicians will continue to benefit from the W+AM program in the upcoming years.

Read the press release.