Twenty-four lucky students from around the world came to York last week to attend a one-week, all-expenses-paid summer school on vision science.
Chosen from 120 applicants, the third-year science undergraduates flew in from across Canada, the United States, Scotland, Lithuania, Russia and China for the May 20-26 Vision Science Summer School offered by York’s Centre for Vision Research in the Faculty of Health. York provided on-campus accommodations, breakfast and lunch each day, a closing banquet and reimbursed transportation costs.
The selected few heard talks and viewed demonstrations by many of the centre’s faculty on current research topics in vision science and participated in laboratory projects. They learned about basic research on vision in humans, animals and machines, and about applied research in virtual reality and visual perception in low-gravity environments.
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| Above: Students look through red-green glasses to see 3D images during a talk as part of York’s Vision Science Summer School |
"We are interested in promoting the Centre for Vision Research to these high-calibre students who may be potential graduate school applicants in the following year," said York psychology Professor Jennifer Steeves, who organized the summer school together with another psychology professor, Richard Murray. They selected 24 students based on reference letters, transcripts and a written statement about why they wanted to attend.
In addition to Murray and Steeves, other vision researchers who gave talks and demonstrations during the week-long event included Doug Crawford, Richard Dyde, James Elder, Mazyar Fallah, Laurence Harris, Denise Henriques, Michael Jenkin, David Regan, Laurie Wilcox, Fran Wilkinson and Hugh Wilson.
The Vision Science Summer School was funded by a training grant from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, several departments and deans’ offices at York University and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.
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| Above: Participants with Jennifer Steeves (standing, far left), Richard Murray (standing, fifth from left) and CVR director Hugh Wilson (standing sixth from right) |