I just wrapped up my Fulbright PhD scholarship in the Arizona and made my way back to France, and I've been wanting to put into words what this experience meant.
This trip gave me far more than I expected. Scientifically, I spent my time working on combining theoretical argumentation and large language models, and I'm leaving with more ongoing projects and ideas than I arrived with. Personally, I grew in ways I didn't anticipate, mostly through the people I had the chance to meet along the way.
A few thank-yous are in order.
To
Mihai Surdeanu, who invited me and made time to meet with me so often, I always looked forward to our discussions, and I learned a great deal from you.
And to
Eduardo Blanco, thank you for the thoughtful exchanges we had.
To everyone at the CLU Lab, thank you for the warm welcome. The moments we shared made this experience what it was.
A special thank-you to
Enfa Fane and
Fahmida Alam for your help, but above all for your friendship.
And thank you to the Computer
Department of Computer Science at The University of Arizona for the poster session and picnic.
To my partner
Gaël Van der Lee and my friend
Marianne THIERY who shared parts of this journey with me: thank you for being there.
To
Srdjan Vesic and
Maxime BROUAT thank you both for being part of this journey from near and far.
And finally, to the
Fulbright France commission, thank you for your support throughout this experience. None of it would have been possible without you.
Grateful doesn't quite cover it.