The 6th annual Undergraduate Architecture Mentoring (uArch) Workshop was co-located with the International Symposium of Computer Architecture (ISCA) 2024, hosted in Buenos Aires, Argentina. As with the previous year, uArch was conducted in a hybrid format, combining in-person and virtual elements. The workshop aims to introduce undergraduate and early master’s students to research and career opportunities in the field of computer architecture. The program covers a wide array of topics, encompassing insights into graduate school lifestyle and technical sessions that explore past, current, and future research directions. Additionally, there are mentoring sessions designed to provide guidance on applying to graduate school and navigating the ever-evolving architecture research landscape. Moreover, uArch fosters opportunities for networking, enabling students to interact with their peers as well as established architects in academia and industry. Seeing the students enjoy the workshop and conference brings us the greatest joy. Here are some snippets from the 2024 cohort’s testimonials:
“My biggest takeaway from the workshop was the importance of balancing technical skills with practical experience and networking to advance in the field of computer systems and architecture”
“I gained a better understanding of the possible paths to a PhD and developed a more grounded plan for the future.”
“The barrier to entry for pursuing graduate school is not as daunting as I conceived it to be prior to the workshop.”
“This is my first time attending such a large conference and workshop. In general, I really learned a lot during those days. My biggest takeaway is that it is more important to be attentive about the professor we want to work with rather than the rank of the university we want to apply to.”
“The workshop was really well organized and an incredible and valuable experience in general”
Outreach
The goal every year is to attract undergraduates and masters from all corners of the globe, with a particular emphasis on regions relevant to the conference’s geographical location. This was all possible through the relentless outreach by the organizers, where we reached out to faculty in Computer Architecture and Systems to spread the word and extend this opportunity to their students. We would also like to extend our greatest gratitude to the General Chairs of ISCA for their unwavering efforts in supporting the uArch workshop.
For the 2024 edition, our focus was on schools in South and Central America, with over 25% of in-person attendees coming from these regions. We reached out to 300 professors from various institutions to provide them with the necessary information to spread the word. As in the previous year, to encourage broader participation by students regardless of financial means, we offered two types of travel grants: a matching grant and a full grant. Matching travel grants enabled professors and universities to cover part of the travel and expenditure, while the full grant was sponsored entirely by uArch funds.
Attendees
We received many impressive applications, just as we have in previous years. However, with the available resources, we could only support 37 in-person attendees and about 80 virtual attendees. As part of the application process, every candidate had to provide a statement of interest, which was reviewed to determine their enthusiasm for graduate education and what they hoped to gain from uArch.
Countries represented by selected in-person applicants in uArch 2024
Schools represented by selected in-person applicants in uArch 2024
Countries represented by selected virtual applicants in uArch 2024
There is still much work to be done. We aim for greater representation from universities worldwide, and support from the entire community is paramount to achieving this.
How can the community help
Sponsor more matching grant students: if you have some fantastic undergraduates and masters students interested in research, please consider supporting them to join uArch through the matching grant program. The applicaiton deadline for the upcoming uArch workshop at MICRO is September 20th, 2024. For more details on the application process, please visit the uArch website.
Mentor the students: many students who attended uArch would significantly benefit from mentors during their graduate application, developing the research interest and agenda, applying to schools, and finding collaborative opportunities for research. If you are interested in mentoring these students please fill this form or send an email to uarchworkshop@gmail.com.
Industry sponsorship: We received significant sponsorship from industry and through the matching grant program. None of this would be possible without the generous support from our sponsors, ACM SIGARCH, ACM SIGMICRO, Google, Meta Reality Labs, AMD, and Microsoft, whom we are thankful to. We would also like to thank the professors who generously participated in the matching grant program. Generous as the sponsorship was, we were only able to sponsor 15% of the applicants to attend in-person, but we had many more talented students whom we would have liked to support. As a community, we need to move forward and promote these students. Therefore, it is important to spread the word to help expand the workshop. We hope to receive more support from both industry and academic partners to highlight these outstanding students.
Join the organizers club: uArch is always looking for passionate individuals to help organize the workshop. Anyone, including undergraduates, graduate students, faculty members or industry professionals, are welcome to join our efforts. Responsibilities include participating in meetings to plan workshop logistics, setting the agenda, reviewing applications, and facilitating the actual workshop. We also continuously seek graduate student mentors to help support uArch participants before and during the conference.
uArch 2024
This year’s uArch workshop featured two keynote talks by Gabriel H. Loh from AMD Research and Akshitha Sriraman from Carnegie Mellon University, offering valuable insights and inspiration on achieving success in graduate school and research. The program also included panels on “The Route to Graduate School,” “Life in Graduate School,” and “Life after Graduate School.” For more details, visit the workshop program page.
The workshop concluded with office hours, where both in-person and virtual students had 15-minute meetings with faculty in a round-robin format. This unique opportunity allowed students to learn about faculty research areas and recruitment processes while faculty engaged directly with potential students. Over 37 faculty members participated, enriching the session with diverse perspectives and expertise.
Office Hours at uArch 2024
It Doesn’t End Here
The work does not end at the workshop, instead, in the future we plan to: (1) pair these students with senior graduate students who are pursuing a Ph.D. degree in computer architecture and build a mentor-mentee relationship, (2) continue our guidance throughout the graduate application process, (3) introduce them to potential advisors, and (4) extend it to other communities and conferences. More ideas are always welcome.
MICRO 2024
This year, we’re excited to announce two editions of uArch: one in Buenos Aires alongside ISCA and a smaller edition co-located with MICRO in Austin, Texas from November 2nd to 6th. Similar to the ISCA edition, the uArch workshop at MICRO will be open to all undergrad and masters students! Please note that our MICRO workshop will be smaller and we will only be offering partial funding. While we cannot provide full funding for MICRO, we strongly encourage North American students to apply. The application deadline for the upcoming uArch workshop at MICRO is September 20th, 2024. For more details on the application process, please visit the uArch website.
Support from the Community
We greatly appreciate the community’s continued overwhelming support. uArch would not be possible without the time, effort, and interest of the keynote speakers, panelists, faculty members who held office hours, student mentors, and ISCA General Chairs. This group effort allowed us to reach approximately 100 students.. We extend our sincerest gratitude to everyone in the community who collectively helped make this edition of the uArch workshop a success.
About the Author:
Irene Wang is a PhD student at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Her research interests focus on designing computing systems for large-scale data center workloads with an emphasis on enabling sustainable computing. She is a recipient of the NSERC Canada Graduate Scholarships – Doctoral (CGS D) program.
Disclaimer: These posts are written by individual contributors to share their thoughts on the Computer Architecture Today blog for the benefit of the community. Any views or opinions represented in this blog are personal, belong solely to the blog author and do not represent those of ACM SIGARCH or its parent organization, ACM.
