FLEET2023 annual workshop in Lorne

Group shot Lorne July 2023

Just under 120 members, family and affiliates gathered in Lorne Victoria this month for FLEET’s 2023 annual workshop, which featured 35 scientific talks (over 60% of them by ECRs), 30 accompanying family (17 kids), a cultural celebration dinner, karaoke, quiz, lawn bowls, and lots of unstructured time for collaborative discussions.

Invited presentations included:

In addition, Michael Ibbotson (University of Melbourne) presented a fascinating talk on energy use in the human brain, an invitation coming out of recent discussions within FLEET and collaborators about neuromorphic (human-brain inspired) computing.

Three tutorials ensured a shared understanding of relevant science, to provide context for research updates that drilled deeper into the science:

We will be sharing the tutorials publicly at a later date.

Winitha Bonney AM workshop on creating an inclusive culture in STEM

The creation of an inclusive culture in STEM was discussed in an excellent workshop run by Winitha Bonney AM, which included positive steps and skills for people to practice in the workplace.

Working frameworks to assess ethical issues in science were discussed in another workshop run by Chris Browne (Responsible Innovation Lab, ANU), using proposed actions towards the recently announced National Quantum Strategy as a ‘test case’.

Two poster sessions of 30 posters each allowed a wider range of science to be examined, with the workshop reversing the usual format (CIs on stage, students at the posters), instead encouraging Centre CIs to present their work via posters, allowing more students and ECRs to talk on stage. Best posters were won by Julian Ceddia and Emily Vu (both Monash), and Caiden Parker (RMIT).

New industry internship opportunities were outlined, with Justin Mabbutt of FLEET partner organisation APR.Intern having a number of one-on-one discussions with FLEET PhD and Masters’ students eligible to take advantage of the new internship funding program.

The workshop dinner on Wednesday night celebrated diversity and inclusion with FLEET members donning traditional clothing from many of the 30+ countries and cultures represented within the Centre. As gateways to conversation, this aided the ongoing effort for members to get to know more about the genuine humans we work with. Mitko Oldfield ran the third series of FLEET trivia after dinner, and FLEET karaoke made a late appearance thanks to the generous forbearance of the facilities team setting up the room for the following day.

FLEET workshops have become known for being family-friendly, with free on-site childcare and subsidies for parents making it easier for parents to attend, and with the presence of children at conference  social events and even at talks (occasionally noisily) ‘normalising’ the situation. A refreshing 30 family members accompanied members this year, including 17 children under 12.

FLEET’s legacy, and the impact of the Centre to date, was a feature of presentations given by Centre COO Tich-Lam Nguyen (outlining some of the positive impacts of the Centre to date, for example against the UN’s sustainability goals), as well as written comments gathered by members on butchers paper. This feedback will feed into Centre plans for the remining year, towards establishing the Centre’s impact.

FLEET’s ECR workshop team also gathered feedback during the week, to ensure that training matches the needs of members.

FLEET volunteers: We have been fortunate in always having great support by our members, whose volunteering helps keep the workshop running smoothly. Thanks to Abhay Gupta, Bianca Fabricante, Daniel MacEwan, Enamul Haque, Kyle Boschen, Michael Lord, Mitko Oldfield, Olivier Bleu, Pablo Resendiz Vazquez  and Ziyuan Zhao.

Member achievements in the last 12 months were celebrated, including

  • Science outreach – Michael Barson and Kenneth Choo (Monash), and Caiden Parker (RMIT)
  • Communication (internal and external) – Mitko Oldfield (Monash)
  • Teamwork (most cross-node papers) – Matthias Wurdack and Eli Estrecho (ANU)
  • Media impact – Sumeet Walia (RMIT) with special mention to Jianbo Tang and Kourosh Kalantar-zadeh (UNSW) and Nicola Gaston (MacDiarmid).

FLEET2023 was held on the land of the Gadabanud (“king parrot language”) people, whose land extends from east of modern-day Lorne to past Cape Otway, near what are possibly the world’s oldest extant aquaculture remains. (See episode 1 of The First Inventors for more.)

“The talks this week have been amazing. We also have not heard from many CIs. I’m not sure if that is correlation or causation. Or whether it’s the result of six years of FLEET training….” — Jared Cole

Errol HuntNews