Located just south-west of Paris in Sevres, the historical Pavillon de Breteuil stands halfway up a hill in Parc de Saint-Cloud overlooking Seine. It is the home of the renowned inter-governmental organisation, BIPM. Every visitor to the site would agree that the magnificent surroundings attracts as much of the admiration from the scientific world as the BIPMfs century-long fine work in metrology and international activities.

A quick look at the two-week programme schedule soon uncovered the understanding that the Summer School was nothing close to a get-away summer vacation. The first week of lectures focused on the basics and fundamental quantities of metrology, such as the topics on International System of units (SI), dimensional metrology, time scales, mass, pressure, Avogadro constant, thermodynamic temperature, vibration, and so on. The second week put the emphasis on upcoming and promising new areas of metrology such as traceability in chemistry, biological standards, deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA), health markers, genetically modified food, astrometry etc.

On average, seven sessions of hourly lectures were scheduled each day. In between lessons, the programme organiser managed to squeeze some time for visits to laboratories and to a museum in Paris. Guided by BIPM researchers, we were introduced to their Observatoire and other laboratories to see projects on ultra-precise mass comparators, measurement of G, dosimetry and activity, ground-level ozone reference standards, international time scales, cryogenic radiometry, quantum hall effect, and frequency comb. Being one of the world-class scientific organisations, their laboratories certainly earn recognition for their outstanding research.

As for the museum tour, out of the over 100 museums in Paris, the programme organiser picked the less well-known (by tourists) ? Conservatoire National Des Arts et Metiers (CNAM) ? to visit. The choice would sound logical only if you understand French. It is a museum for scientific instruments. I would not think of a better place to visit than CNAM simply because what was on display there coincided with the purpose of the Summer School: it was all about metrology. With the aid of the tour guides, students were brought back in history to witness the evolution of metrology. While we got together this time at BIPM to study modern metrology, it was surely intriguing to see how the predecessors had done their work. For this reason, the French people dedicated a museum to represent the significance of metrology on the premise of human desire in making life better. No wonder they have always been the frontrunner in promoting international standards on measurements.


A salute to organiser and lecturers

During the Summer School, I was most impressed with the level of the involvement from the programme organiser and the lecturers. From the hotel selected (which is just minutes by foot from the campus) to the level of interaction with participants both in and out the classroom, their passion for the programme and profession was unprecedented and appreciated highly by all the students. An added bonus was the last day of Tour de France when we were treated to the view of world-class cyclists passing through the front street of the hotel.
Although arrangements were made for us to visit Paris often, the packed schedule of lessons meant there was no daylight left for sightseeing in this great city. Yet, such arrangements created a great social environment for participants to interact with each other under a more relaxed setting, thus, making it the beginning of many lasting friendships.
Under a rich learning environment, the Summer School ended with a positive reception and enjoyment from all students and lecturers. A party was arranged on the last night at a French restaurant in the Saint-Cloud Park. Needless to say everyone agreed that BIPM and its staff have done a great job in organising this Summer School.
And of course, this was a very profitable trip for me both on technical and personal grounds. As a general consensus from all the participants: letfs see it done again.