I Just Want to Be a Quiet Top Student

Director Fefferman said: "The organizing committee asked me to recommend a young mathematician from Princeton to give a conference report. I think the most suitable candidate is you. Theorems' integrated into one material, it will be a good report material."

"Odd, as for whether you can win the award, I don't know. Maybe you have already been selected as a candidate. Who knows? The operating method of this organizing committee is copied from the Oscars, and the list of winners is announced at the last moment."

"Okay, I'll prepare the materials for the report." Shen Qi accepted Director Fefferman's recommendation, and if there is a prize, he has to fight for it, regardless of the big prize or the small prize.

The Breakthrough Prize is actually quite a big prize, with a single prize of up to 3 million US dollars, far exceeding the Nobel Prize and the Philippine Prize. The winners are generally more prestigious scientists in the academic world.

The Breakthrough Prize comes with a New Horizons Prize, which is dedicated to rewarding young scholars in the fields of biology, physics, mathematics, etc., with a single prize of US$100,000.

Shen Qi, who never misses the coffee time on Wednesday, has become a key training object of the Mathematics Department of Pudong University. Among this group of doctoral candidates, Shen Qi is the best. Some young lecturers in the Mathematics Department have not achieved as good as Shen Qi.

After Terence Tao, the Department of Mathematics of Pudong University seems to have experienced a gap in the cultivation of young mathematicians. In the past two decades, except for Terence Tao, no one can name a mathematician trained by Princeton.

Princeton needs a group of young mathematics stars who are as outstanding as Tao Terence to revive the glory of the capital of mathematics.

Mathematics stars must come from the training system of Princeton. The talents produced by their alma mater are different from those who have been harvested. Those who have made a lot of money and become famous all donate money to their alma mater, and the acceptance speech mentioned their alma mater.

Some resources of the Department of Mathematics of Pudong University began to lean towards Shen Qi, and the international mathematics conferences that could participate arranged for Shen Qi to participate, and Shen Qi’s name would be included in the awards that could be recommended.

Because last semester's tutorial class was so good, this semester Shen Qi was invited by the provost to have a meal, and the provost hoped that Shen Qi could lead another semester of tutorial class.

Shen Qi is Professor Muller's teaching assistant, and he can also be Professor Muller's research assistant.

Most professors hope that their graduate students can devote more energy to help them with scientific research projects. People are more or less selfish, and scientific research projects can produce results. Tutoring undergraduates is a duty.

Pudong University has a rigid rule that professors must complete a certain number of hours of undergraduate teaching each semester, and the remaining hours will be completed by lecturers.

As for the tutorials, they are basically in charge of the teaching assistants. Pudong University also hires special tutors for the tutorials, and gives the lecturer treatment, especially the outstanding ones can enjoy the treatment of an associate professor.

The arrangement of the tutorial courses is in the charge of the academic affairs group, and Shen Qi agreed to the request of the dean to lead the tutorial courses for another semester.

Shen Qi has no hard scientific research tasks now, and he likes to deal with energetic young undergraduates. This semester, he hand-picked four undergraduates to join his tutoring class.

The four boys, Ajie, Luka, John, and Stephen, are the four that Shen Qi especially admired. In the non-Euclidean geometry tutorial class last semester, these four undergraduates had the best grades.

The dean added eight other undergraduates to join Shen Qi's tutoring class, and these eight boys also had excellent academic performance.

The twelve most outstanding undergraduates from the Department of Mathematics this year formed a "rocket class", and Shen Qi was in charge of tutoring their two courses, number theory and functional analysis.

"It seems that the Department of Mathematics of Pudong University has realized the crisis, and it really started from a baby." Shen Qi has long seen the crisis hidden under the prosperous surface of the Department of Mathematics of Pudong University. In the past ten or twenty years, Berkeley, The "West Coast Mathematics Consortium" formed by UCLA and Caltech had a great impact on Princeton's mathematics department.

Before the 1990s, the Department of Mathematics of Puda could single out the entire western United States.

Today's Universidad Mathematics Department can only single out California, which is not enough.

Berkeley, UCLA, Caltech, and Stanford. If the mathematics departments of these four universities join forces to fight against the Mathematics Department of Puerto Rico, the Mathematics Department of Puerto Rico may only turn to the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton for help.

It is not that the Department of Mathematics of Puda has become weaker, but that its competitors have become stronger rapidly.

"If you don't think about making progress, it is tantamount to going backwards. If you can't come up with original theories, it's tantamount to learning mathematics for nothing." Shen Qi seriously warned his twelve students in the tutoring class.

"Odd, your tone sounds like a professor, only a professor would say that." Stephen said while lying on his side on the lawn. He had never seen a teaching assistant so awesome.

As the weather gradually warmed up, Shen Qi arranged for the tutorial class to be held on weekend afternoons, and the location was outdoors.

Outdoor academic exchanges are a tradition of Universities. Outside the building of the Department of Mathematics is a vast lawn with several detachable blackboards erected in the lawn.

The blackboard is about two meters high and four meters wide. Some academic teams brought chairs with folding tables and gathered in front of the outdoor blackboard for academic discussions.

Some people are tired from sitting on the chairs, so they lie on the lawn, making it as comfortable as possible.

With bright sunshine and a free academic atmosphere, no one forces Pudu students to study, but there is no excuse not to study, so let's study hard.

"You are already third-year students. If a third-year student cannot write a thesis, it is tantamount to degeneration." Shen Qi attaches great importance to political education for students, and those who are not qualified in politics are embarrassing.

"Qi, in what grade was your first paper published?" Luca asked.

Shen Qi said: "My first mathematics paper was published in the third year of high school. In fact, I did not go to the third year of college. After two years of undergraduate study in China, I came to Princeton to study as a graduate student."

"Qi, the longer I've known you, the more frustrated I've been." Ajie couldn't sit still in the chair. He got up and lay down on the lawn beside Stephen, with his face facing the blackboard.

Universities in the United States usually have two undergraduate graduations each year, one spring graduation in May and one autumn graduation in December.

Summer class graduations in August are relatively rare, but they do happen.

These twelve boys all entered the school two years ago in the spring and are now in the third grade. They will graduate in the fall in December next year.

In fact, Shen Qi went to college a year and a half earlier than them, and was one or two years older.

One of the twelve third-grade students is from an Arab country. He dropped out of school for more than a year because of the war in his country. He is seven months older than Shen Qi and will soon be 23 years old.

Shen Qi is the same age as the twelve students in his tutoring class. The reason why he can become a tutor and tutor professional courses for his peers is because he is better than his peers.

Princeton students, on the other hand, are better than their peers at most other schools.

There is a strong atmosphere for undergraduates to participate in scientific research. Some of the research involved in undergraduate papers can only be carried out at the graduate level in other universities in the United States. Undergraduates with excellent grades have the opportunity to access cutting-edge research that is only available to graduate students and doctoral students in other universities. equipment.

Some of the first authors of Princeton papers published in authoritative academic journals such as Science and Nature are undergraduates.

Beginning in the third grade, undergraduates of Pudong University have to participate in thesis projects. They write thesis not to get a diploma, but to improve their academic accomplishment.

It is very difficult to get a diploma in Pudong University. If you can’t produce some dry goods, you will not be allowed to graduate. When will you have a correct attitude and when will you graduate.

Shen Qi entered the professional course tutoring session: "I am in charge of your two courses this semester, number theory and functional analysis. If you want to write papers in these two fields, I can provide some professional opinions and suggestions. Next, you Do you want to listen to number theory, or do you want to listen to functional analysis? In my tutorials, I do not recommend that you ask mathematical questions other than number theory and functional analysis, such as topology, partial differential equations, etc. But you really want to Stretch out, and I think I can handle that too."

"That is to say, I can ask you any questions about mathematics?" Ajie asked.

Shen Qi nodded: "Jack, you can understand it this way. So now, do you have any math questions you want to ask?"