Travel: NSF Student Travel Grant for the 2026 Midwest Machine Learning Symposium

The 2026 Midwest Machine Learning Symposium (MMLS) will be held at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, on June 24–25, 2026. MMLS is an annual regional conference dedicated to fostering communication and collaboration among machine learning researchers at all career stages across the Midwest. The symposium brings together graduate students, faculty, and industry researchers for a program featuring plenary talks by senior researchers from across the country, invited talks primarily by junior and mid-career Midwestern faculty, poster presentations largely by graduate students, and panels and industry-focused events led by senior and industry researchers. MMLS aims to advance the frontiers of machine learning and artificial intelligence and their applications, laying the groundwork for future interdisciplinary and cross-institutional collaborations. The symposium elevates the profile of machine learning research across Midwestern institutions by strengthening a regional community centered on collaboration and mentorship. With particular emphasis on the development of junior researchers, including graduate students, postdoctoral scholars, and early-career faculty, MMLS fosters both educational and professional growth among its participants. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria. NSF Award ID: 2617259 | Program: 01002627DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT | Principal Investigator: Ruqi Zhang | Institution: Purdue University, WEST LAFAYETTE, IN | Award Amount: $25,000 View on NSF Award Search: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/show-award/?AWD_ID=2617259 View on Research.gov: https://www.research.gov/awardapi-service/v1/awards/2617259.html