Elena Trapeznikova: "Summer school has become for me not only new knowledge, but also experience in general."
In June 2017, Elena Trapeznikova, an young researcher at the Laboratory, while still a student at HSE-Perm, participated in the I.S.E.O Summer School in Italy and talks about why the Summer School inspired her.
In June of this year, just after the defense of the bachelor thesis, I had the chance to visit the best, in my opinion, Summer School in Economics: I.S.E.O Summer School. I had such an experience for the first time: I have never been to Europe, never participated in summer or winter schools, and, moreover, I have never met Nobel laureates in my life.
Every day, we were given 2-3 lectures by the best professors in the field of economics: Michel Boldrin, Dimitra Petropolu and others. However, communication went far beyond lectures, questions and answers. All professors are very interested in what they are doing, and literally at every table at dinner one could hear: “What do you think about Brexit?” Or “But today you said, I would like to clarify ...”. A special point, of course, were the lectures of Nobel laureates. And they were all completely different. If Jean Tyrol talked more about things that describe the ethical behavior of a person, then Eric Maskin explained in great detail the economic and mathematical model of the labor market and its division, and Michael Spence presented the work of robots at Amazon and spoke about the opportunities for economic growth.
And this is not just training in economics, it is also a cultural exchange. Summer School participants gathered from all over the world: Russia, Canada, USA, Brazil, Chile, Philippines, European countries and beyond. And there you realize that you are surrounded by very smart and unique people. After all, only there you can meet with the best Masters and PhD, as well as employees of Bloomberg or the Central Bank of Belgium. A particularly memorable moment was a joint trip to Venice, when participants from Italy told what and how you should do here, see, notice. When you plunge together in a new culture, new traditions, or just enjoy the local flavor.
Summer school has become for me not only new knowledge, but also experience in general. And for the opportunity to visit there, I would like to thank IDLab. Thank you very much!