[TYPES/announce] 13th Estonian Winter School in Computer Science, Call for Partic.

[Tarmo Uustalu]

[The courses of Benton, Harel and Meseguer are on programming theory 
topics.]

[Lecturers: Benton, Harel, Kushilevitz, Meseguer, Persiano.
Place/time: Palmse, Estonia, 2-7 March 2008.
Deadline for application and submission of abstracts for student
talks/posters: ** 18 Jan 2008 **.]


                         Call for Participation


         13th Estonian Winter School in Computer Science, EWSCS '08
                                       
                    Palmse, Estonia, 2-7 March 2008

                     http://cs.ioc.ee/ewscs/2008/



Background and objectives 

EWSCS is a series of regional-scope international winter schools held
annually in Estonia. EWSCS are organized by Institute of Cybernetics
(IoC), a research institute of Tallinn University of Technology.
EWSCS '08 is the thirteenth event of the series.
    
The main objective of EWSCS is to expose Estonian, Baltic, and Nordic
graduate students in computer science (but also interested students
from elsewhere) to frontline research topics usually not covered
within the regular curricula.  The subject of the schools is general
computer science, with a bias towards theory, this comprising both
algorithms, complexity and models of computation, and semantics, logic
and programming theory. The working language of the schools is
English.


Programme 

The schools' scientific programme consists of short courses by
renowned specialists and a student session.

The course list for EWSCS '08 is the following:

* Nick Benton (Microsoft Research, Cambridge, UK):
  Modelling and Reasoning about State
    
* David Harel (Weizmann Institute, Rehovot, Israel):
  Biological Systems as Reactive Systems
    
* Eyal Kushilevitz (Technion, Haifa, Israel):
  Randomization Techniques for Secure Computation and Parallel 
  Cryptography

* José Meseguer (Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA):
  Specification, Verification and Programming in Rewriting Logic
    
* Giuseppe Persiano (Università di Salerno, Italy):
  Zero Knowledge and the Construction of Secure Encryption Schemes

The purpose of the student session is to give students an opportunity
to present their work (typically, thesis work) and get feedback.
Registrants are invited to propose short talks (20 min) or posters.
The selection will be based on abstracts of 150-400 words.
    
The social programme consists of an excursion and a conference dinner.


Venue 

Palmse is a small settlement 80 kms to the east from Tallinn in the
county of Lääne-Viru. It is renowned for a large manor that used to
belong to the von Pahlen family, today hosting the visitors' center of
the Lahemaa National Park, a museum, and a hotel.

Tallinn, Estonia's capital, is famous for its picturesque medieval Old
Town, a UNESCO World Heritage site. There are direct flights to
Tallinn from London, Dublin, Milan, Amsterdam, Brussels, Frankfurt,
Hamburg, Berlin, Vienna, Prague, Warsaw, Moscow, Kiev, Copenhagen,
Oslo, Stockholm, Gothenburg, Helsinki, Vilnius, Riga, ferries from
Stockholm and Helsinki. From Vilnius, Riga, St Petersburg the
Eurolines coach services are the practical travel option.


Application and cost 

The deadline for application and submission of abstracts is 18 January
2008. All applicants will be notified of acceptance to school and
acceptance of their student talks/posters by 1 February 2008. The
participation fee 5000 EEK / 320 EUR includes course materials, full
board accommodation at Palmse, transportation from Tallinn to Palmse
and back, excursion and conference dinner.


Programme committee / organizing committee

Tarmo Uustalu (IoC) (chair), Monika Perkmann (IoC) (secretary), Helger
Lipmaa (U. College London), Peeter Laud (U. of Tartu), Varmo Vene
(U. of Tartu), Sven Laur (Helsinki U. of Techn.), Ando Saabas (IoC)


Sponsors 

Tiger University Plus programme of Estonian Information Technology
Foundation (pending), Doctoral School in ICT of Measure 1.1 of the
Estonian NDP


Further information 

Details on the submission of abstracts, application procedure and cost
are available from the school webpage, http://cs.ioc.ee/ewscs/2008/. 
Questions should be sent to ewscs08(at)cs.ioc.ee.