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The VIGRE Program at the University of Utah
Report on the Years 2003 - 2004
Overview
2003-2004 VIGRE Highlights
People Involved in the VIGRE
Program
Programs for High School Students
- Math Circle 2003 - 2004
- Summer High School Program
- Ndahoo'ah Program
Programs for Undergraduate Students
- Academic Year REU Program
- Summer 2004 REU Program on "Inverse Problems and Applications"
- Undergraduate Colloquium
- Summer ACCESS Program
- Senior Seminar
- Problem Solving Competition
Programs for Graduate Students
- Graduate Colloquium
- Mini-Course on "The Synthetic Geometry of the Weil-Petersson
Metric"
- Mini-Course on "Classical Problems in Commutative Algebra"
Committee on Diversity
VIGRE 3rd-Year Assessment Report
The VIGRE program at the University of Utah is a
department-wide program (about 2/3 of our present faculty members
participate in some form of activity of the program) that addresses
education and research at all levels and all areas of specialization
represented in the department. Ever since the initial discussions
started within the department to prepare an application for a VIGRE
grant, additions have been made to our research and educational
programs, which have been well received and have had considerable
impact. These changes have brought forth increased activities on the
instructional as well as research levels from our outreach efforts to
the training of undergraduate and graduate students, as well as the
training of postdoctoral assistant professors. The design of the
program creates interactions between postdocs, graduate students,
undergraduates, and even high school students by having each
VIGRE-supported person participate in some form of VIGRE activity.
There is a broad range of choices (see below) and thus each supported
graduate student and/or postdoc can select the kind of program they
wish to help with or lead. Occasions, of course, will arise when
assignments have to be made for reasons of equity. Participation in
the components of the VIGRE program is also open to all graduate
students and postdocs, regardless of their VIGRE eligibility. In
fact, some of the graduate students and post-docs having made
outstanding contributions to our VIGRE programs are ineligible for
VIGRE support.
All facets and participants of the program are evaluated at the end of
each semester. These evaluations are either in the form of
questionnaires (for programs that have several participants) or
personal evaluations by mentors and participants. The evaluations are
collected and analyzed and used to tune the program as a
whole.
This past year was the third year of the program and, according to NSF
practices, was the year of decision whether the program be continued
for another two years. With much input from our three advisory
committees, we performed an in-depth review of our accomplishments and
submitted a detailed report about them to the NSF. During October, a
NSF team (two program officers and a colleague from another
university) site visited the department and conducted interviews with
many of the VIGRE participants. We soon (December 2003) learned that
the continuation of the program had been approved for another two
years.
The various portions of this report have been collected, compiled, and
prepared by Sarah Strong (Program Coordinator) and Klaus Schmitt
(Director) of the VIGRE program. Thanks are due to many colleagues
who have contributed to the program with their ideas and time.
A summary of the programs and their impact follows.
- Math Circle:
This is a highly successful program for selected talented
high school students.
The Circle meets on a weekly basis and is conducted by a faculty
member (during the first year by Peter Trapa, then by Nick Korevaar,
and last year again by Peter Trapa) assisted on a regular basis by
VIGRE assistant professors, VIGRE graduate fellows, and one non-VIGRE
graduate fellow. The program's emphasis is very much on problem
solving and, during the past year, a total of 56 students from several
junior and senior high schools along the Wasatch Front participated in
all or a portion of the program. This program very much reflects
vertical integration as pre-college and graduate students, as well as
post-docs and faculty interact. Four of the students from the first
year of the program graduated from high school and enrolled for
undergraduate study at Brown (1), Cal Tech (1), and the University of
Utah (2). Information is available for five of the graduating seniors
from the second year of the program. They attended Utah State
University (1), Brigham Young University (1), the University of Utah
(1), Georgia Tech (1), and Harvey Mudd College (1). Information is
unavailable from the third year of the program.
- High School Summer Program:
As opposed to Math Circle, this program focuses on Number Theory and
takes place during three weeks of each summer. This year was the
fifth year of the program, and was the fourth year that the program
has received VIGRE funding. It is open to talented high school
students. During each of the past summers, approximately twenty
students from schools throughout the state (but mostly from the
Wasatch front) participated in the program. Several of these
students, upon graduating from high school, have become students at
the University of Utah with majors in mathematics. For example, Ryan
Rettberg, who was in the first Summer Mathematics Program for High
School Students, became an undergraduate at Utah, participated in
REUs, and is now one of our VIGRE graduate students. Jim Carlson
conducted the programs. At least two graduate students are chosen to
assist in the program each year, and several faculty members have
presented lectures on different mathematical topics.
- Additional Outreach:
As in previous years, Nick Korevaar (assisted in some years by a
female graduate student from the department) conducted the mathematics
portion of the College of Science's ACCESS program. This program is
attended each year by 21 talented entering freshman women. The
program also supported (in part) the Mathematics Department's outreach
efforts on the Navajo reservation by sending mathematicians there to
generate interest in our subject amongst the local high school
students. This is done by demonstrating the use of modern technology
and mathematics in generating new geometric designs of patterns used
in weaving.
- Undergraduate Colloquium:
The Undergraduate Colloquium was organized just prior to the start of
the VIGRE program and has been run by the Director of Student Services
(Angie Gardiner) and two faculty members (Nat Smale and Gordan Savin,
both members of the Steering Committee). Faculty members, as well as
graduate and undergraduate students present lectures chosen to
acquaint students at an early stage with research topics and present
overviews of important areas of mathematics. Students may receive
university credit for attending the colloquia and it is expected that
undergraduate majors attend the colloquium during at least one of the
years of their studies. Another purpose of the colloquium is to
introduce students to possible topics for REU projects.
- Modules:
Written modules on some mathematical topics have been prepared. This
project is supervised by Nick Korevaar, who is assisted by one of the
VIGRE assistant professors. The modules are available as supplements
for course materials for both undergraduate and graduate courses.
Several have been used successfully.
- Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU):
Two types of REU programs take place in the department. There is the
REU summer program for which a small number of students (at most a
dozen) are selected to work on projects with a common theme. This
program is supervised by a faculty member who is assisted by VIGRE
graduate students and a VIGRE assistant professor. Such programs took
place during the summers of 2001 and 2002 and were concerned with
problems from knot theory and hyperbolic geometry and random walks and
simulation analysis, respectively. A third REU, covering rational and
integer points on elliptic curves took place during the summer of 2003
and a fourth concerned with inverse problems was held during the
summer of 2004. Seven students participated during each of the first
two summers, eleven participated in 2003 and ten in 2004. Two
students in the 2002 program, three in the 2003 program, and three in
2004 were from institutions other than the University of Utah.
The second REU program takes place throughout the academic year and
ideally involves a student, a graduate student, and a faculty mentor.
A student chooses a research topic with the approval of a faculty
mentor. The team of three, mentioned above, then meets at frequent
intervals to discuss and assess progress made. Several very
interesting and successful projects of this type have been conducted
during the past year. At least four of the REU students have spoken
on their work at national conferences or work-shops. Should a student
not be able to make satisfactory progress because of various reasons,
the project may be terminated. Unfortunately, a couple of projects
had to be terminated during the 2001-2002 academic year. During this
past two years, the students met to discuss their research projects at
a weekly seminar. Among those graduating in the 2001-2002 academic
year, two chose to become mathematics graduate students and one chose
computer science as a program of study. Information is available for
four of the graduating seniors from 2003. One took a year off before
continuing on to graduate school. The other three became mathematics
graduate students at the University of Utah. Of the 2004 graduates,
four went on to graduate school and one went to work in industry. One
of the students who went on to graduate school went into medicine at
George Washington University. The other three went into mathematics
at UCLA, University of Maryland, and the University of Utah. This is
a strong indicator that pipeline questions are being addressed
successfully.
- Expanded Graduate Recruitment and Training:
Our graduate program is advertised nationally and internationally in
various publications, such as the NOTICES of the American Mathematical
Society. In addition, advertisements and posters are distributed to
many mathematics departments and individuals soliciting applications
to graduate study. Prospective graduate students (such as those
having participated in the PUTNAM competition and similar events) are
contacted personally, as well. The top recruiting prospects are
invited to visit our campus for a three-day weekend during March. The
recruits are then provided the opportunity to become acquainted with
the various programs of the department and get to know the campus and
city. The current graduate student population actively participates
in the recruitment process by acting as hosts to the invitees. The
number of applicants during the past four years are as follows:
Approximately 130 students applied in both 2001 and in 2002. In 2001,
46 of those applicants were U.S. citizens while 56 were in 2002. The
2003 recruiting season saw 225 applicants, 91 of whom were
U.S. citizens (a significant increase!) and in 2004 there were 225
applicants of which 90 were US citizens or nationals. In 2001, there
were fifteen offers of VIGRE fellowships to recruit six students, in
2002 there were ten offers to recruit four students. The other four
VIGRE graduate students were chosen from among our present graduate
student population who had chosen research areas and were scheduled to
complete the requirements for the Ph.D. during the next two years. In
2003, ten VIGRE offers were made to recruit six students. The two
other students were chosen from within the existing, more advanced
graduate student population. In 2004, twelve VIGRE offers were made
to recruit four incoming students.
All new incoming graduate students participate in an intensive
two-week training program, which takes place immediately before the
start of the fall semester. Each graduate student is assigned a
faculty mentor who closely monitors the students' progress in their
program of study. Four graduate students who have been supported in
part by VIGRE have now graduated with Ph.D. degrees; one is a VIGRE
post-doc at the University of Texas at Austin, one is a post-doc in
our department, one is an assistant professor at Utah State
University, and one is a post-doc at the University of Nebraska at
Lincoln.
- Graduate Colloquium:
The Graduate Colloquium is organized by the Graduate Student Advisory
Committee (GSAC). The speakers are either graduate students or
faculty members. Faculty members are encouraged to speak about their
areas of research at a level appropriate for beginning graduate
students. Graduate students giving lectures will usually be advanced
students who speak about their area of research. The colloquium
provides an excellent training ground for giving talks, an important
skill in academia as well as other professions, in a relatively
sheltered and friendly environment. Additional work needs to be done
to increase attendance by REU and graduate students. Part of this
colloquium series is also a workshop on the writing and competing for
research grants. Here, young researchers who have successfully
competed for a research grant give accounts of their experiences. Our
grant accountant also presents details on the more technical and
administrative aspects of the process.
- Preliminary Examination Study Camps:
Graduate students are encouraged to sit for the written qualifying
examinations at the end of their first year of graduate study. The
summer after their first two semesters of study is the time of
preparation for these examinations and extensive sessions to help
prepare are being conducted. The graduate students organize these
sessions and each subject area has a faculty volunteer who has agreed
to provide discussion time and help during the summer. The sessions
have been helpful according to the students involved and have been
organized by VIGRE graduate fellows. Since the autumn of 2002, each
graduate course, which qualifies as a preliminary examination subject,
has had an assigned graduate student volunteer, who conducts problem
sessions for the particular course. This particular facet was
suggested by graduate students and has been conducted on a trial
basis. The Department established a committee to review our
preliminary examination structure nearly two years ago; a report with
recommendations will hopefully be forthcoming soon.
- Mini-Courses:
During May and June of 2002, the department conducted two
mini-courses, each of two weeks' duration. The intent of
such courses is to introduce graduate students to research
topics in a quick, efficient, and intensive way. These
courses are open to students from our own university as well
as a select number of U.S. graduate students from other
universities. The VIGRE grant has limited funds to cover the
expenses for the students from other universities who have
been selected to participate as well as funds to to support
an outside lecturer. Bringing these students together and
exposing them to a well-chosen authority on the topic of the
course furnishes a broad educational and research experience
and has the double benefit of offering a student a new point
of view and fostering extensive contact for our faculty and
postdocs at the research level. The mini-courses further
promote the concept of vertical integration by having the
local graduate students and postdocs participate in the
organization and running of the courses. The courses were
advertised nationally via the internet as well as through
regular mail to departments having graduate programs in
mathematics.
There have been two mini-courses in each of the past three
summers. The summer 2002 mini-courses were ``Complex
Hyperbolic Geometry'' (May 13-24, 2002), and ``Variational
Methods and Nonlinear PDE'' (May 28-June 8, 2002). The
``Complex Hyperbolic Geometry mini-course was run by Jim
Carlson and Domingo Toledo and attended by thirteen external
graduate students and one local student. The ``Variational
Methods and Nonlinear PDE mini-course was run by Klaus
Schmitt and attended by six external and five local graduate
students. The first of the summer 2003 mini-courses was
``Mathematics Behind Biological Invasions'' (June 2-13,
2003) which was run by Fred Adler and attended by sixteen
external and one local student. The second, ``Waves in
Inhomogeneous Media'', took place July 28-August 8, 2003
and was organized by David Dobson. Ten external and ten
internal students were in attendance. Two further
mini-courses were organized for the summer of 2004; they
were ``The Synthetic Geometry of the Weil-Petersson Metric''
(May 10-21, 2004) and ``Classical Problems in Commutative
Algebra'' (June 7-18, 2004). The first was organized by
Ken Bromberg and Mladen Bestvina while the second was run by
Florian Enescu and Paul Roberts. Seven external students
attended the first while the second saw fifteen external and
two internal graduate students in attendance. Two courses
will again take place during the early summer of 2005.
- The Post-Doc Program:
The Department has had a successful postdoctoral program
since the early 1970s. The program has had a broad impact
on the teaching and research environment of the Department
and many successful mathematicians have been part of the
program and are now important voices of the national and
international mathematical scene. Through VIGRE, the
Department has amplified the mentoring activities of the
postdocs and increased their involvement in departmental
activities. VIGRE postdocs are involved in Math Circle
activities (one, David Hartenstins, has co-organized the
Math Circle program), participate in the organization of
mini-courses, help organize seminar series (one has helped
run the GRE prep course and organized this course by himself
the following year), and are offered to teach topics courses
in their areas of specialty. Two such one-semester graduate
courses were offered by David Hartenstine (Topics in
Nonlinear PDE) and Jesse Ratzkin (Geometric PDEs). One
post-doc (Javier Fernandez) helped run a summer's REU
program, and one has been supervising a REU project. Also, one
non-VIGRE postdoc is presently supervising a REU project.
Their mentors also encourage early application for research
grants and special Grants Preparation Seminars are held for
their benefit. Further inolvement in the mathematical life
outside the department is encouraged and one of the postodcs
has become a member of Project NExT. Using VIGRE funds,
postdocs have had the opportunities to purchase books,
journals and other educational materials and also are
supported to attend research conferences in their
specialties, important activities for young researchers. At
no time in the past has the department had the chance to
support postdocs in this manner and the above serve as
indicators that an effect of the change of culture has been
accomplished by the VIGRE grant. During the first year of
the program there were four positions available, during the
second year there were five, and during the third year there
were six. While one of the first year post-docs left after
the first year, the three others remained for the full three
year term and have now accepted jobs at other institutions.
One will be at a research institute in Argentina (Instituto
Balseiro - Universidad Nacional de Cuyo - Republica
Argentina), one at the University of Connecticut, and one at
Western Washington University.
During the past spring we hired four new VIGRE post-docs
from an applicant pool of 298 of which 107 were eligible for
VIGRE support. Six VIGRE offers were made.
- Summary:
As can be seen from the above, VIGRE has had a considerable
impact on the Department's teaching and research activities,
on the outreach efforts, and on the recruitment of students
into mathematics. Participant evaluations and evaluations
from our External Advisory Committee, Internal Advisory
Committee, and Outreach Advisory Committee of our programs
have been collected (and are available in this report).
These have been used and further will be used to fine-tune
and improve the various parts of the program. While the
recruiting of excellent graduate students and postdocs
remains the most important task, particularly of those from
underrepresented groups, the grant has had a definite
multiplier effect throughout the Department. Increased
interaction between students and faculty is taking place at
all levels.
- Dissemination to the Mathematical Sciences Community:
All of our VIGRE activities (organizational structure,
recruiting advertisements, reports, etc.) are posted on the
web.
This site is maintained by the Program Coordinator and
updated in a timely fashion. Members of the Steering
Committee have participated in meetings with schools that
are also VIGRE sites to exchange experiences. Members of
our Outreach Advisory Committee are advertising our outreach
efforts to mathematics specialists at Utah school districts.
All recruitment advertising is disseminated by regular mail
and email notices and is posted with national sources such
as the MAA and AMS REU sites. Thus, all reports filed on
REU projects, descriptions of High School and Math Circle
programs, mini-course lectures and the like are available to
the general public. More detailed addresses for some of the
individual programs are the following (each will lead to
further addresses which contain additional details about the
particular program, such as lecture notes, etc.):
- Changes that Have Occurred:
Considerable changes have taken place in the Department's
research and teaching activities since the preparation of
the grant proposal commenced. These include the
introduction of the graduate and undergraduate colloquia,
the Math Circle, preparation of modules, the introduction of
mini-courses, and two types of REU programs. In addition,
we have introduced an expanded and vertically integrated
mentoring program, which has been described above. The
Department recently was the first department in the College
to be awarded a new subject-oriented Honors program. While
the University of Utah has had a general education honors
program for many years, subject-oriented honors programs
have been absent. Coupled with our REU program, the new
Honors program will serve our outstanding undergraduate
students well and students' honors theses may well be the
outgrowth of REU projects. A new five year combined
bachelors and masters program with a major in mathematics
has recently been approved and will soon be in place.
Students participating in REU projects at an early stage
will be particularly suitable for such a program with REU
projects leading to Masters projects. Students in this
program will have a much greater opportunity to complete the
requirements for the Ph.D. in a shorter time period than the
five-year period we described above. Without the support of
VIGRE, such a program would likely not have taken place. We
have also received funding from the Eskuche Foundation and
from the Math and Science Education Foundation to run the
Math Circle program.
Back to Table of Contents
March 2003: Internal Advisory Committee meeting and report;
Outreach Advisory Committee meeting and report; AMS-SIAM-NSF
April 2003: External Advisory Committee visit and report
funding opportunities conference
June 2003: Summer REU; Summer High School program: ACCESS
program; Mini-course on Biological Invasions
July 2003: Mini-course on Waves in Inhomogeneous Media
August 2003: TA-TF training
September 2003: Math Circle starts
October 2003: NSF site visit for three year review of
program
December 2003: Notification that program will be continued by
NSF
February 2004: Appointment of new VIGRE post-docs
March 2004: Assessment meeting with graduate students and
post-docs
April 2004: New graduate students appointed
May 2004: Mini-course on Synthetic Geometry of Weil-Petersson
Metric
June 2004: Mini-course on Classical Problems in Commutative
Algebra; ACCESS program; Summer REU; Summer High School Program
Back to Table of Contents
The following is a list of people involved in the VIGRE
Program including their various activities. This list
includes all VIGRE Graduate Students, VIGRE Assistant
Professors, people from outside the Mathematics Department
who have contributed to the Program, as well as faculty and
staff from the Department who have made contributions. We
note that a large majority of our faculty and several of our
graduate students are involved in some form of activity
related to the VIGRE program.
Fred Adler, Associate Professor of Mathematics and
Biology
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Organizer of the Mini-Course on the Mathematics
Behind Biological Invasions, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Assistant Professor Mentor
Nathan Albin, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Boot Camp Organizer, Math Circle Mentor,
REU Mentor, GRE Prep Course Mentor, Senior Seminar Mentor,
Summer REU Mentor
Peter Alfeld, Professor and Associate Chair of
Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Assistant
Professor Mentor, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Daniele Arcara, Assistant Professor of Matheamtics
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Efraim Armendariz, Professor of Mathematics and Chair,
University of Texas
VIGRE Activities: External Advisory Committee Member
Mark Avery, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
David Ayala, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Mentor, REU Mentor
Brandon Baker, Associate Instructor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Nelson Beebe, Research Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Robert Bell, VIGRE Assistant Professor
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Mentor and Lecturer, Boot Camp
Mentor, Lecturer at the Mini-Course on the Synthetic
Geometry of the Weil-Petersson Metric, Graduate Colloquium
Lecturer
Maria Bell-Scott, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Mentor, REU Mentor, Summer
High School Program Mentor, ACCESS Mentor
Aaron Bertram, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Steering Committee Member, Co-PI of the
VIGRE Grant, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Summer REU
Organizer, Assistant Professor Mentor, Graduate Fellow
Mentor, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Mladen Bestvina, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Graduate Fellow Mentor,
Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Undergraduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Math Circle Lecturer, Assistant Professor Mentor,
Co-Organizer of the Mini-Course on the Synthetic Geometry of
the Weil-Petersson Metric
Paul Bressloff, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Graduate Fellow Mentor,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, Graduate Colloquium
Lecturer
Jeffrey Brock, Associate Professor of Mathematics, Brown
University
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on the
Synthetic Geometry of the Weil-Petersson Metric
Ken Bromberg, Assistant Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Co-Organizer of the Mini-Course on the
Synthetic Geometry of the Weil-Petersson Metric, REU Mentor
Robert Brooks, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Chair of Internal Assessment Committee,
Preparation of Modules, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Gene "Drew" Butcher, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Mentor, Summer High School
Program Mentor
Rex Butler, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Mentor, Summer High School
Program Mentor
James Carlson, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Coordinator of the Summer High School
Program, REU Mentor, Assistant Professor Mentor,
Co-Organizer of and Lecturer at Mini-Course on Complex
Hyperbolic Geometry, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Steering Committee Member, Co-PI of the VIGRE Grant, Math
Circle Lecturer, Summer REU Organizer, Graduate Colloquium
Lecturer
Renzo Cavalieri, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Mentor and Lecturer, Graduate
Colloquium Lecturer
David Chapman, Professor of Geology and Geophysics,
Dean Graduate School
VIGRE Activities: Internal Advisory Committee Member
Suneal Chaudhary, VIGRE Assistant Professor
Andrej Cherkaev, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, VIGRE Assistant Professor
Recruitment, REU Mentor, Co-organizer and Lecturer for Mini-course on Waves in Inhomogeneous Media
Elena Cherkaev, Research Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Co-organizer and Lecturer for Mini-course on Waves in Inhomogeneous Media
Kenneth Chu, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, Colloquium Organizer
Matthew Clay, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Boot Camp
Mentor, Math Circle Mentor, REU Mentor, Summer REU Mentor
Kree Cole-McLaughlin, REU Student
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Eric Cook, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Mentor, Math
Circle Mentor, High School Summer Program Mentor
Carl Cowen, Professor of Mathematics at Purdue University
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Alastair Craw, Assistant Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Scott Crofts, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: GRE Prep Course Mentor, Senior Seminar
Mentor
Eric Cytrynbaum, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Martin Deraux, Associate Instructor
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at Mini-Course on Complex
Hyperbolic Geometry
David Dobson, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Steering Committee Member, Organizer of
the Mini-Course on Waves in Inhomogeneous Media, Graduate
Fellow Mentor, Co-Organizer of the Summer REU Program on
Inverse Problems and Applications, Undergraduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Elizabeth Doman, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Sankar Dutta, Professor of Mathematics, University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on Classical
Problems in Commutative Algebra
Berton Earnshaw, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
Florian Enescu, Assistant Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Math Circle
Lecturer, Co-Organizer of and Lecturer at the Mini-Course on
Classical Problems in Commutative Algebra, REU Mentor
Boas Erez, Visiting Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Stewart Ethier, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Elisha Falbel, Professor of Mathematics, University of
Paris
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at Mini-Course on Complex
Hyperbolic Geometry
Javier Fernandez, VIGRE Assistant Professor
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at Mini-Course on Complex
Hyperbolic Geometry, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, GRE Prep
Course Mentor and Organizer, Senior Seminar Mentor, Boot
Camp Mentor, Summer REU Mentor
Paul Fife, Professor Emeritus of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor
Aaron Fogelson, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Fellow Mentor, Graduate
Colloquium Lecturer, VIGRE Assistant Professor Recruitment,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, REU Mentor
Stefanos Folias, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, REU Mentor,
Boot Camp Organizer
Angie Gardiner, Director of Student Services
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Series Organizer,
Summer High School Program Coordinator, Publicity
Sarah Geneser, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Mentor, Math
Circle Mentor, Assistant with Summer REU Program on Random
Walks and Simulation
Pam Giles, Mathematics Specialist, Jordan School District
VIGRE Activities: Outreach Advisory Committee
Kenneth Golden, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Coordinator of REU Program,
Graduate Fellow Mentor, Math Circle Lecturer, Graduate
Colloquium Lecturer, Co-Organizer of the Summer REU Program
on Inverse Problems and Applications, Undergraduate
Colloquium Lecturer
Fletcher Gross, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, Math
Circle Lecturer, Honors Program Director, Graduate Fellow
Mentor
Robert Guy, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Mentor, High
School Summer Program Mentor, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, Math Circle Lecturer,
Boot Camp Mentor, Math Biology Journal Club Co-Organizer
Robert Hanson, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Math Circle
Lecturer, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
David Hartenstine, VIGRE Assistant Professor
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at and Co-Organizer of
Mini-Course on Variational Methods and Nonlinear PDE,
Preparation of Modules, Organizer of PDE Seminar, Math
Circle Mentor and Lecturer, PDE/Geometry Seminar
Co-Organizer, REU Mentor, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Evan Haskell, Assistant Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Henryk Hecht, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Graduate Fellow Mentor,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Ray Heitmann, Professor of Mathematics, University of
Texas
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on Classical
Problems in Commutative Algebra
Scott Hendrickson, Mathematics Specialist, Alpine
School District
VIGRE Activities: Outreach Advisory Committee Member
Lajos Horvath, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor
Melvin Hochster, Distinguished Professor of
Mathematics, University of Michigan
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on Classical
Problems in Commutative Algebra
Jon Jacobson, Assistant Professor, Pennsylvania State
University
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at Mini-Course on Variational
Methods and Nonlinear PDE
Phil Johnson, Mathematics Specialist, Sevier School
District
VIGRE Activities: Outreach Advisory Committee Member
Michael Kapovich, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Fellow Mentor, VIGRE Assistant
Professor Recruitment, REU Mentor
James Keener, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Fellow Mentor, Undergraduate
Colloquium Lecturer, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Marilyn Keir, Associate Instructor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Outreach Advisory Committee
Davar Khoshnevisan, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Coordinator of the Summer REU Program on
Random Walks and Simulation, Undergraduate Colloquium
Lecturer, REU Mentor
Sarah Kitchen, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
Brynja Kohler, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, Boot Camp Mentor, Math
Circle Mentor, Math Biology Journal Club Co-Organizer
Piotr Kokoszka, Professor of Mathematics, Utah State
University
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Nick Korevaar, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Steering Committee Member, Co-PI of VIGRE
Grant, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, Preparation of
Modules, Co-Organizer of ACCESS Summer Program, Participant
in VIGRE Conference, Lecturer in Mini-Course on Variational
Methods and Nonlinear PDE, Coordinator of and Lecturer at
Math Circle, Graduate Fellow Mentor
Robert Lazarsfeld, Professor of Mathematics,
University of Michigan
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
An Le, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Vy Le, Associate Professor, University of Missouri
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at Mini-Course on Variational
Methods and Nonlinear PDE
Mary Levine, Graduate Secretary
VIGRE Activities: Recruiting Weekend Coordinator
Mark Lewis, Professor of Mathematics at the University
of Alberta
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on the
Mathematics Behind Biological Invasions
Larsen Louder, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Mentor, Math
Circle Mentor, Assistant with Summer REU Program on Random
Walks and Simulation, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Frank Lynch, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Math Circle Mentor, Summer REU
Mentor
Pejman Mahboubi, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
Dan Margalit, VIGRE Assistant Professor
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Mentor and Lecturer, Boot Camp
Mentor, Lecturer at the Mini-Course on the Synthetic
Geometry of the Weil-Petersson Metric
Jean Mawhin, Professor of Mathematics, Universite
Catholique de Louvain
VIGRE Activities: Principal Lecturer at Mini-Course on
Variational Methods and Nonlinear PDE
Aaron McDonald, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Meagan McNulty, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Mentor, Math
Circle Mentor, Prelim Boot Camp Co-Organizer, Graduate
Colloquium Lecturer
Grigory Mikhalkin, Associate Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Dragan Milicic, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Graeme Milton, Professor and Chair of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, Math Circle Lecturer
Claudia Miller, Professor of Mathematics, Syracuse
University
VIGRE Activites: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on Classical
Problems in Commutative Algebra
Michael Neubert, Associate Scientist at Woods Hole
Oceanographic Institution
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on the
Mathematics Behind Biological Invasions
Wieslawa Niziol, Associate Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor
Andrew Oster, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Robert Palais, Research Associate Professor of
Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor
George Papanicolaou, Professor of Mathematics at
Stanford University
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on Waves in
Inhomogeneous Media
Brad Peercy, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Cindi Phillips, Mathematics Department Accountant
VIGRE Activities: VIGRE Grant Accountant, Graduate
Colloquium Lecturer
Gregory Piepmeyer, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Boot Camp
Mentor, Math Circle Mentor, REU Mentor, Summer REU Mentor
Thomas Pietraho, VIGRE Assistant Professor
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Assistant and Lecturer,
Assistant in Summer High School Program
Emily Putnam, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Mentor, GRE Prep Course
Mentor, Senior Seminar Mentor, Summer REU Mentor, ACCESS
Mentor
Paul Rabinowitz, Professor of Mathematics, University
of Wisconsin
VIGRE Activities: External Advisory Committee
Jesse Ratzkin, VIGRE Assistant Professor
VIGRE Activities: High School Summer Program Mentor,
Lecturer at Mini-Course on Variational Methods and Nonlinear
PDE, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Undergraduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Math Circle Mentor and Lecturer, Boot Camp Mentor,
PDE/Geometry Seminar Co-Organizer
Ian Renner, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Ryan Rettberg, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Mentor, Boot Camp Mentor,
Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Russell Richins, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
Tom Robbins, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Paul Roberts, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Graduate
Fellow Mentor, Co-Organizer of and Lecturer at the
Mini-Course on Classical Problems in Commutative Algebra
Hugo Rossi, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Steering Committee Member, Co-PI of VIGRE
Grant, Coordinator of REU Program, Undergraduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Co-Organizer of Summer High School Program,
Graduate Student Recruitment, Participant in VIGRE
Conference, Math Circle Lecturer
Matthew Rudd, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Prelim Boot Camp Organizer and
Mentor, Assistant in Organizing and Lecturer at Mini-Course on
Variational Methods and Nonlinear PDE, Graduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Math Circle Lecturer, PDE Seminar Co-Organizer
Sean Sather-Wagstaff, Postdoctoral Fellow, University
of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
VIGRE Activites: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on Classical
Problems in Commutative Algebra
Fumitoshi Sato, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Gordan Savin, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Steering Committee Member, Co-PI of VIGRE
Grant, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, Co-Organizer of
Undergraduate Colloquium Series, REU Mentor, Graduate Fellow
Mentor, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Klaus Schmitt, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: P.I. VIGRE Grant, Director of Steering
Committee, REU Mentor, Graduate Fellow Mentor, Assistant
Professor Mentor, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Preparation of Modules, Organizer of and Lecturer at
Mini-Course on Variational Methods and Nonlinear PDE
Richard Schwartz, Professor of Mathematics, University
of Maryland
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on Complex
Hyperbolic Geometry
Jon Seger, Professor of Biology
VIGRE Activities: Internal Advisory Committee Member
Inbo Sim, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Anurag Singh, Assistant Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Nathan Smale, Professor and Associate Chair of
Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Steering Committee Member, Undergraduate
Colloquium Lecturer, Co-Organizer of Undergraduate
Colloquium, Internship Organizer, Lecturer at the Mini-Course on
Variational Methods and Nonlinear PDE, Assistant Professor
Mentor, REU Mentor
Sandra Spiroff, VIGRE Assistant Professor
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on Classical
Problems in Commutative Algebra, Undergraduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Ryan Stones, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Mentor, Math
Circle Mentor, Prelim Boot Camp Co-Organizer
Sarah Strong, VIGRE Program Coordinator (Since
December, 2001)
Nancy Sundell-Turner, VIGRE Assistant Professor
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Lecturer, Undergraduate
Colloquium Lecturer, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer, Boot Camp
Mentor, Math Biology Journal Club Organizer, Lecturer at the
Mini-Course on the Mathematics Behind Biological Invasions,
ACCESS Mentor
William Symes, Professor of Mathematics at Rice
University
VIGRE Activities: Lecturer at the Mini-Course on Waves in
Inhomogeneous Media
Jennifer Taback, Visiting Professor
VIGRE Activities: Math Circle Lecturer, High School Summer
Program Lecturer
Al Taylor, Professor of Mathematics, University of Michigan
VIGRE Activities: External Advisory Committee Member
Joseph Taylor, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Recruitment of VIGRE Assistant Professors
Brenlyn Thiriot, VIGRE Program Coordinator (Until
December, 2001)
Joshua Thompson, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Robert Thorn, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Mentor, Math
Circle Mentor, Assistant with Summer REU Program on Random
Walks and Simulation
Domingo Toledo, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Co-Organizer of and Lecturer at the
Mini-Course on Complex Hyperbolic Geometry
Peter Trapa, Assistant Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Coordinator of and Lecturer at Math
Circle, Assistant Professor Mentor, Graduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer, Graduate Fellow
Mentor, REU Mentor
Andrejs Treibergs, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Lecturer at Mini-Course on Variational Methods and
Nonlinear PDE, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Peter Trombi, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Steering Committee Member, Co-PI of VIGRE
Grant, Graduate Recruitment, Participant in VIGRE
Conferences
Don Tucker, Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Michael van Opstall, VIGRE Assistant Professor
Sylvia Wiegand, Professor of Mathematics, University
of Nebraska
VIGRE Activities: External Advisory Committee Member
Jim White, University of Utah Career Services
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer
Michael Woodbury, VIGRE Graduate Fellow
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, GRE Prep Course Mentor,
Senior Seminar Mentor, Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Grady Wright, VIGRE Assistant Professor
VIGRE Activities: Boot Camp Mentor, Numerical Analysis
Seminar Organizer, Summer REU Mentor, Graduate Colloquium
Lecturer
Jingyi Zhu, Associate Professor of Mathematics
VIGRE Activities: REU Mentor, Undergraduate Colloquium
Lecturer, Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
John Zobitz, Graduate Student
VIGRE Activities: Undergraduate Colloquium Lecturer,
Graduate Colloquium Lecturer
Back to Table of Contents
MATH CIRCLE 2003-2004
By Peter Trapa
The purpose of these notes is to document the activities of
the Math Circle during the 2003--2004 academic year.
Summary:
The 2003-2004 installment of the Math Circle represented
its third year of existence. The program is healthy and
successful and I anticipate its continued success in the
2004-2005 academic year. Nonetheless there is room to grow
and improve. My most immediate concern is participation,
especially among women and minorities, and this is discussed
in greater detail below.
Format:
This year, the Circle began September 27, 2003, and met from
4-6pm each subsequent Wednesday of the Fall and Spring
terms; it finished on April 28, 2004. As in previous years,
two consecutive weeks were devoted to the same topic and
were typically led by the same person. A typical session
consisted of about 45 minutes of the leader lecturing at the
board and an hour of problem solving. (15 minutes were
usually reserved for breaks.) It worked best when the
lecturing and problem solving were intermingled.
The focus continued to be enrichment, as is evidenced from
the list of topics given below.
Topics:
Topics, in chronological order, were as follows:
- Magic Squares and Modular Arithmetic (Peter Trapa, 2 weeks)
- Algebraic Curves (Renzo Cavalieri, 2 weeks)
- Infinity and Induction (Peter Trapa, 2 weeks)
- What is Symmetry? (Bob Bell, 2 weeks)
- Four-Dimensional Cubes (Dan Margalit, 2 weeks)
- Permutations and the 15-puzzle (Peter Trapa, 3 weeks)
- Unique Factorization (Sandra Spiroff, 2 weeks)
- Topological Constructs (Eric Cook, 2 weeks)
- Distance and Metric Spaces (David Hartenstine, 2 weeks)
- Genetic Selection (Nancy Sundell-Turner, 2 weeks)
- Five weeks were devoted to contests
Homework:
In past years, assigning any kind of homework was usually a
disaster. Virtually none was assigned this year.
What makes a good session?:
This is documented carefully in the 2001-2002 year-end
report. My only comment here is that we were again able to
achieve a friendly, respectful atmosphere that engendered
creativity and cooperation.
Contests:
Contests continued to be an important and successful feature
of the program. All were administered "in class"; there
were no take-home contests. (Previous years have had poor
response rates.)
Personnel:
Eric Cook was my assistant. He did an excellent job,
despite being busy with many other commitments.
Additionally I got quite a bit of support from the VIGRE
postdocs assigned to the program, Dan Margalit and Bob Bell.
Both were outstanding. The graduate students who rotated
through the program did a nice job - nothing spectacular,
but generally competent.
Apart from the sessions I led, all others were either led by
graduate students or postdocs. Of course, there is nothing
wrong with that; uniformly they took their responsibilities
seriously and produced well-prepared and thoughtful
presentations. The lack of permanent faculty this year only
points to an excellent untapped source for next year.
Beyond those charged with Math Circle responsibilities
through VIGRE, I would like to point out the exceptional -
and purely voluntary - contributions of Frank Lynch (a
graduate student) who attended and helped with nearly every
session. David Hartenstine was also very helpful in a
volunteer capacity. Additionally, Bell and Margalit both
went above and beyond their official responsibilities.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, it was a pleasure to
work with Sarah Strong. Her efficiency and careful
attention to detail were extremely valuable and ensured that
the program ran smoothly.
Participation:
One constant concern is the fall-off in attendance that we
(over the past three years) have witnessed near the end of
each term, as well as in the middle of the Spring term.
This year was no exception. We started strong in the Fall,
and through natural attrition, arrived at a good core group
of 15-20 students by the end of October. That core group
stayed reasonably constant throughout the Fall. In the
Spring, the numbers were lower and dropped even lower near
Spring Break before rebounding at the end.
Most of the attendance fluctuations are inevitable. In the
beginning, some naturally find that the program is not for
them and stop attending. As for the Spring, there seem to
be more extracurricular activities that eat into our core of
serious participants. My only recommendation is to continue
to step up phoning and emailing during these extra-busy
times. (Sarah and Kathleen Kerr were very helpful with
phoning this Spring.)
Outlook and Suggestions:
For next year, I propose targeting more women and minority
participation. It seems that the program is
well-established with certain area high schools -
principally West, Skyline, Alta, and Highland - as perhaps
80% of our participants hailed from them. West provides
the most the most diverse crowd, both in terms of the
number of females and minorities. It may make sense to
make extra advertising allowances to other traditionally
diverse schools next year. Perhaps I should visit math
classes in these schools next Fall before the program
starts.
On a related issue, a principal means to augment the
interest of current female and minority participants is
through sessions led by (surprise) females and minorities.
We did an OK job with women this year (with sessions led by
Spiroff and Sundell-Turner). The demographic reality of the
department always makes finding women to lead sessions
tough. But it's important, and energy should be devoted in
this direction next year.
Unlike last year (under Korevaar's direction), we did not
devote any time to state and national contest problems. We
chose to do this based on the seemingly tepid response
evident on last year's evaluations. Nonetheless, I think I
made a mistake by not pursuing contest preparation this
year. I would like to give it another try next year,
perhaps by slightly modifying Korevaar's original approach.
With a modicum of effort based on the suggestions above, we
can add to the momentum of this established and successful
program.
SUMMER HIGH SCHOOL PROGRAM
By Jim Carlson
Summary:
The Summer Mathematics Program for High School Students at the
University of Utah provides outstanding students an opportunity to
develop their talents to the fullest. By presenting intriguing
puzzles, challenging problems and powerful ideas, the program
stimulates curiosity, develops the intellect, and lays a strong
foundation for future work in mathematics, the sciences, or science
related careers.
Participants:
This year we had twenty students participate in our summer program:
fifteen from the Salt Lake City area, one from Vernal, two from Cedar
City, one from Ferron, and one from Florida. Three were between their
freshman and sophomore years, six were between their sophomore and
junior years, and eleven were between their junior and senior years.
Five of the participants were female.
Jim Carlson returned from Cambridge, Massachusetts to direct the
program, and he was assisted by two graduate students funded through
the VIGRE grant (Drew Butcher and Rex Butler), and one graduate
student funded through the department (Maria Bell). Angie Gardiner
also helped organize the program, and several faculty members
participated in the colloquia.
Format:
The program ran for three weeks (June 14 - July 1), four days a week,
8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. In the morning students worked on number
theory, learning about topics such as Diophantine Equations, modular
arithmetic, properties of the primes, and continued fractions. There
were also two contests. The first was to break secret messages sent
using RSA cryptography. The second was to find the parameter N for
Pell's equation x2 -
Ny2 = 1 with the "best" ratio R = (digits
of x)/(digits of N), where (x,y) is the smallest solution with
positive coordinates. The students particularly enjoyed these
contests.
After lunch students attended a colloquium whose topics ranged widely
indeed: Peter Alfeld, "Infinity is Different"; Aaron Bertram,
"Pythagoras vs the Elliptic Curve"; Klaus Schmitt, "Fractals"; Jim
Carlson, "The Mathematics of Google"; Fred Adler, "Cicadas"; David
Dobson, "Inverse Problems"; Peter Trapa, "It's a Small World"; Davar
Khoshnevisan, "Normal Numbers", Sandra Spiroff, "Unique
Factorization"; Jim Carlson, "Some Unsolved Problems in
Mathematics."
Each day ended with a 90-minute computer lab in which the students
learned to program in Python and do experimental number theory with
it. They solved problems such as: find a 100-digit "industrial prime";
solve the equation 123456789x - 235711y = 1; let p =
10100 + 267; compute 2 to the power N mod
p, where N = 3100 +
7100.
Resources:
Problem sets, handouts, a Python tutorilal, etc. are available on the
web.
Concerns/Recommendations:
- We would like to see more participants come from outside the Salt
Lake City area. Next year we plan to advertise in neighboring
states.
- It has worked well to have at least one of the graduate assistants
return the next year. This provides continuity and experience, and we
would like to continue this.
- A year ago we used "alumni assistants," undergraduate students who
were former participants of the program. We would like to be able to
do this again in the future.
NDAHOO'AH PROGRAM
By Kelly MacArthur
The teachers we sent down taught two two-hour courses per
day with each class consisting of 12-16 Navajo students.
The ages ranged from 12 to 17 years old, which covered quite
a diverse skill level. The classes mainly taught Logo
programming to enable the students to represent their Navajo
craft design graphically on the computer. The students
themselves spent another two hours per day in class with
Navajo elders learning how to make a traditional craft. In
addition to Logo, our teachers taught geometry and other
math skills needed for the students to be successful with
their Logo projects.
The classes were fairly balanced when it came to gender.
When asked on the last day of class whether or not they were
planning on attending college, about half of them said yes.
Many more said they didn't have any plans yet.
The VIGRE money you gave us went to pay for two trips for
myself down to Monument Valley. I went once in April to
meet with Pat Seltzer, the principal at Monument Valley High
School (MVHS). During that visit, I was introduced to the
program's history and goals. Pat also showed me around the
school so I could understand the setup of the classes, etc.
I also went down again in June to see how the teachers were
doing and observe the program in progress. The rest of the
money you gave us went toward David Seal's travel expenses.
He was one of our teachers. We all drove down. I stayed in
a motel when I went, but David and Chris (our two teachers)
stayed on campus in an extra apartment.
The main overall goal of the program itself is to teach the
Navajo crafts to the students in order to keep those
traditions alive. Our main goal is to support that process
with an infusion of modern technology and mathematics. It
is the blend of the craft with mathematics that makes this
program most beneficial. Eventually, we'd like to see the
program grow to serve more students and perhaps serve as a
model for other American Indian programs. An additional
goal is to keep the U of U interested and committed to the
betterment of their math instruction and learning, in other
ways besides just the Ndahoo'ah program.
Back to Table of Contents
ACADEMIC YEAR REU PROGRAM
By Kenneth Golden
The undergraduate participants of the REU program have
engaged in a broad range of exciting mathematical projects
and begun to produce substantial results that are being
reported in professional venues.
Over the past year we have had 18 individual research
projects, including those supported by VIGRE and NSF REU
Supplements. The topics have included neuronal modeling,
Ito diffusions, binary quadratic forms, resistor networks,
social networks, the visual cortex, optimal design, Fourier
analysis, continued fractions, sea ice, DNA melting curves,
biomedical imaging, and statistical models of time series.
The participants ranged from freshmen to seniors, and six of
these projects were conducted by women undergraduates. One
of these students was recruited directly from the ACCESS
summer program for scientifically talented women entering
the University. Many of our students have given lectures on
their projects in a wide range of venues, including local
seminars and national undergraduate conferences. One of our
students presented her research to world experts in her
field at Victoria University in New Zealand, and a paper on
her project is written and will be submitted for publication
shortly. At least two other REU projects are being prepared
for publication in professional journals. Five of our
students have journeyed to the Arctic for their research
projects over the past two years. Since the inception of
the REU program in 2001, about 55 students have
participated, some of whom are still in the program. Of
those who have graduated and for whom we have information,
at least 22 have entered graduate or professional schools,
most of them in mathematics or closely related areas.
Finally, while many factors have played a role, it is
apparent that the REU program has certainly helped to raise
the level of interest in undergraduate mathematics at the
University of Utah. Let M be the combined number of
declared majors and pre-majors in Mathematics. Over the last
four years from 2000 to 2003, the values of M have been 160,
157, 206, and 223.
SUMMER 2004 REU PROGRAM ON "INVERSE PROBLEMS AND
APPLICATIONS"
By David Dobson
The Summer 2004 REU Program on "Inverse Problems and
Applications" was held during the six-week period June 1
through July 9, 2004. The goal of this REU was to introduce
participating students to some of the basic ideas underlying
inverse problems and to quickly transition to work on
individual research projects. The program was conducted by
David Dobson and Ken Golden, with assistance from postoc
Grady Wright, and graduate student Frank Lynch.
A total of ten students participated in the program. Six
students were from the University of Utah and the remaining
four were from other institutions across the country (UC
Berkeley, Rose-Hulman, SUNY Geneseo, and Colby College).
Students ranged widely in rank from freshmen to finishing
seniors, and just as widely in backgrounds and interests.
The basic format of the program was to meet as a group twice
daily, Monday through Friday: two hours in the computer lab
each morning, and two hours in the classroom each afternoon.
The first two weeks of classroom time were devoted to
background lectures covering relevant concepts from linear
algebra, basic functional analysis, differential equations,
and a variety of examples of inverse problems in
applications. Initially, the morning sessions in the
computer lab were devoted to introductory projects in Matlab
and LaTeX, and to familiarization with internet-based
research resources. These labs were run by Grady Wright and
Frank Lynch. After the first two weeks, focus of the
program turned gradually to individual student mentoring as
they began to work on their research projects. Each student
was provided with help, references, and direction each day.
Parts of the morning and afternoon meetings were also
devoted to student presentations.
Two milestones were set for the students. First, after the
first three weeks, each student was to have chosen a
research problem, and prepared a short oral presentation
describing the problem and background material. Second, at
the end of the program, students were to have prepared final
oral and written reports. All students met the first
milestone, although a few did not turn in a final written
report.
Some students entered the program with good ideas for
research topics, and chose projects right away. Several
other students were able to identify appropriate problems
after some nudging in the right direction. And several
other students chose problems which were presented in class
as possible course projects.
The program appears to have been a success for all
involved. Lack of time was a problem. Some student
projects were showing promise for developing interesting
(publishable) results, but the six weeks were over too
quickly (on the other hand, most participants were exhausted
after six weeks). Some students planned to continue working
on the projects. In retrospect, some of the time pressure
may have been alleviated by focusing more on group projects.
Student surveys were collected at the end of the program.
Overall, responses were nearly uniformly positive. One
point we could improve upon in the future would be to
provide a meal plan and more social/recreational activities
for the out-of- state students.
Much of the material from the Summer 2004 REU program can be
found on the website.
UNDERGRADUATE COLLOQUIUM
By Gordan Savin
The Undergraduate Colloquium was organized by Angie Gardiner
and Gordan Savin. The purpose of the colloquium is to
popularize our undergraduate program and to introduce
students to a variety of ideas and problems in mathematics
and its applications. The colloquium is open to everyone,
but students my enroll and earn one university credit,
provided that they attend regularly and write a paper on one
of the colloquium topics. We had five and four students formally
enrolled in the Fall and Spring semesters, respectively.
The general attendance was well over twenty during the Fall
term, but it tapered off, especially as the school year was
approaching its end. The speakers were our regular faculty,
instructors, two visitors, and two graduate
students. (Unfortunately, we did not have any speakers
coming from industry, rather than academia.) We had a total
of 27 lectures. The following is a selection of talks:
- Graeme Milton, "Bubbly Fluids and Stealthy Submarines"
- Fletcher Gross, "Counting with Groups"
- Jingyi Zhu, "From Parts Failure in a Car to Enron's Default"
- Stewart Ethier, "Seven Shuffles Suffice"
- Fred Adler, "Can Ants Do Calculus?"
- Henryk Hecht, "Regular Polyhedra"
- Jim Carlson, "The Mathematics of Google"
- Mike Woodbury, "Congruent Numbers and Elliptic Curves"
- David Dobson, "Smelborp Esrevni: Backward Thinking
and Its Applications"
SUMMER ACCESS PROGRAM
By Nick Korevaar
ACCESS is an eight-week, half day program for incoming freshman
women interested in science and engineering. This College
of Science program was created a decade ago by then Dean
Hugo Rossi, and has been directed for quite a few years by
Professor Sid Rudolph of the Physics Department. Each
summer, 21 bright and energetic students arrive on campus
and spend different weeks in the various science
departments. The goals of the summer session are to
familiarize the students with the University, with the
opportunities in each discipline, with college-level work,
and, most importantly, to let them develop supportive peer
relationships. Each week the women are divided into seven
fresh groups of three students each and, after learning
about the week's topic in detail, they use the following
week to complete group projects. Nick Korevaar led the two
Math weeks in 2004. In 2003 he was assisted by VIGRE
postdoc Nancy Sundell-Turner and VIGRE graduate students
Emily Putnam and Maria Bell. This year there were no female
VIGRE graduate students, and we did not succeed in
recruiting an alternate female student from within the
Department.
The first math week was built around Simon Singh's "The
Code Book", moving historically from substitution ciphers
to the number theory behind RSA internet security. Nick
presented the ideas of frequency analysis for solving
substitution ciphers, having each group decrypt portions of
what turned out to be an interesting historical account of
Sophie Germain's struggles to become a mathematician. Jim
Carlson gave two guest presentations on number theory and
RSA security, and these were built around sessions in which
the women were led to anticipate and follow up on the
mathematical ideas that Jim introduced. Towards the end of
the week, and because cryptography can be thought of as an
analogy for most scientific research, Biology Professor Jon
Seger spoke on the genetic code. He presented the history
and details about how it was deciphered, and the ACCESS
women appreciated the analogies with their cryptography
work. For their group projects, the ACCESS women created a
moderately scaled RSA cryptosystem, tested it by sending
encrypted messages to each other, and wrote papers
explaining what they had done.
The second math week was devoted to classical and fractional
scaling laws in mathematics and science. The week began
with classical scaling of lengths, areas and volumes when
space is dilated. This led us to different ways in which
space can be distorted, and a focus on the geometry of
affine transformations in the plane. We observed that fern
leaves, broccoli, and circulatory systems seem to have
scaling properties which are more complicated than what one
studies classically. This led to a review of some
historical fractals such as the Cantor set and Sierpinski's
triangle, and to the more recent realization that many
fractals can be obtained as the limit of iterated set
mappings, often using affine contractions. Fred Adler gave
a guest presentation on a paper of West, Brown, and Enquist
which attempts to use a branching, fractal-like model of
circulatory systems, to explain a famous scaling law in
biology, that animal metabolism scales like mass to the 3/4
power. For their projects, students used affine
contractions to create original fractals, and explained how
they did it. They also used class and national data to
deduce that there is an empirical power law relating human
heights to weights, but that the power one obtains is not
the one used in the well-known body mass index (BMI). They
wrote a research paper on the origins and uses of BMI. It
turns out that there is a better power law, consistent with
their own work from the class data, and that this correct
power was actually known to Verhulst in the early 1800s.
During the second week, Angie Gardiner led an advising
session about math classes, the math major and minor, and
honors in mathematics. Ken Golden gave a lecture on his sea
ice experiments and modeling, and since he is also our
Director of Undergraduate Studies, he spoke about research
opportunities for undergraduates in our Department. In
particular, he highlighted REU work he has mentored, and the
fact that an ACCESS woman from last year is now working on a
sea ice imaging project under his supervision.
For more information on the ACCESS program, go to the College of Science's webpage.
Click here for more details about
this year's mathematics component.
SENIOR SEMINAR
By Nick Korevaar
The Senior Seminar, begun in 2002-2003, was continued in
2003-2004. The seminar provides an opportunity for
students who are working on undergraduate research projects
to hear about the research of other students, to observe
ways in which to make such research presentations, and to
prepare and make reports of their own. This year, the
seminar was organized by Klaus Schmitt and Nick Korevaar.
VIGRE Assistant Professor Javier Fernandez and VIGRE
graduate students Mike Woodbury and Scott Crofts assisted.
The seminar was held on Monday afternoons of spring
semester, starting at 3:00 pm and continuing for about an
hour. Initial presentations were by former and experienced
REU students, beginning with an introductory session by Mike
Woodbury, who was an REU student in 2002-2003. In addition
to talking about his work, he gave pointers to the students
about making research presentations. As the semester
continued we had current, less-experienced REU students
present their work. These talks tried to set a model for
informality and presentation of ideas rather than
computations; the model was not always followed, but usually
so. Following are the titles of presentations with the
names of the presenter and mentor.
- Mike Woodbury (2/2/04): "Presenting Research to Your
Peers, and my Explorations of Rational and Integers
Points on Elliptic Curves"
Faculty Mentor: Aaron Bertram
- Rex Butler (2/8/04): "Simulation of the Nonlinear
Voter Model"
Faculty Mentor: Davar Khoshnevisan
- Mike Hofman (2/23/04): "Continued Fractions and Number
Theory"
Faculty Mentor: Gordan Savin
- David Groulx (3/1/04): "Modeling the Folding of
Cloth"
Faculty Mentor: David Hartenstine
- Ryan Behunin (3/8/04): "Optimization for Unknown
Loads"
Faculty Mentor: Andrej Cherkaev
- John Faust (3/22/04): "Mathematical Models of
Orientation and Direction Selectivity in Primary
Visual Cortex"
Faculty Mentor: Paul Bressloff
- Zsuzsanna Horvath (3/29/04): "Asymptotic Properties of
GARCH"
Faculty Mentor: Davar Khoshnevisan
- Pejman Mahboubi (4/5/04): "Constructing a Continuous
Function for which the Fourier Series does not
Converge"
Faculty Mentor: Nat Smale
The seminar met with mixed success. Students who presented
felt that the experience was quite valuable. The organizers
and VIGRE assistants tried to create in informal atmosphere
in which questions and suggestions were encouraged, and this
seems to have been successful. Still, several of the
audience students said that they felt overwhelmed by the
math being presented. Also, some presenters indicated that
they could have used more mentoring on how to make the
presentation, before actually making it. It should be
possible to address these shortcomings by using our VIGRE
personnel more effectively, instead of just having them
attend the seminar and make comments.
Student attendance was on the low side; we could do a better
job of making sure that all REU participants and mentors are
aware of the seminar and its potential value. If we run the
seminar in the spring of 2005, we should take care of
organizational details in fall 2004, so that people can plan
their schedules accordingly.
PROBLEM SOLVING COMPETITION
By Dan Margalit
I have been helping with the Undergraduate Problem Solving
Competition since March. In that time, I have found this
job to be a pleasant experience.
Overall, the competition seemed to be somewhat of a
success. Approximately fifteen different students turned in
correct solutions to the six problems posted over the year
(somehow, six doesn't seem like a lot). There were four or
five different first place winners. I believe that most
participants were undergraduates.
One disappointment is that the overall winner has declined
the invitation to compete in the national contest at
Mathfest. I have emailed the second place winner, and have
not heard back.
I enjoyed talking to Mike Hofmann, as we discussed possible
problems for posting. He has agreed to go to MathFest.
(This is one of the perks for posting and grading the
problems).
I'm not sure how much impact this contest has on anybody.
The problems tended to be straighforward. I had little
interaction with the students, aside for a few meetings with
Mike. I think Angie gave books to the winners.
There are at least three different contest organizations:
Putnam, Calculus Challenge, and Problem Solving
Competition. I wonder if more could be accomplished by
combining forces, whatever that means.
I hope to help with this again next year, and I hope we can
think of ways to make this a more engaging and fruitful
endeavor.
Back to Table of Contents
GRADUATE COLLOQUIUM
By Stefanos Folias
The graduate colloquium is one of the activities organized
by the Graduate Student Advisory Committee. Both graduate
students and faculty members feature as speakers in the
colloquium. Faculty members are invited to present, in a
fairly elementary and possibly broad way, their
area of research. This is helpful for graduate students in
that it shows in what research individual faculty members
are interested, and it helps students who are "shopping",
i.e., who still need to decide on a field of specialization.
The reason for an elementary talk is to ensure that it will
not only be accessible to them, but also to ensure that they
may understand and appreciate the field or topic, which is
particularly important for those students who are deciding
on a professor, area of research, and what not. We
definitely wish to encourage, rather than discourage, and
talking at a more advanced level tends to have the latter
effect.
For graduate students who are already working in a specific
area, it is a great occasion to be exposed to different
kinds of mathematics. Graduate students are also strongly
encouraged to give a talk, either on their current research
or on an interesting topic of their choice. This provides
an excellent form of "training" for giving talks (which is a
required skill in academia or any other professional
setting) in a relatively sheltered and friendly environment.
Again, the goal is to encourage rather than discourage. We
are not trying to teach one how to give a good talk, rather
to provide for graduate students the chance to give a talk
in a less stressful forum.
The complete list of talks we have organized this year is
posted on the web.
This report is an update to the last letter
which discusses the background and previous state of the
following issues. The current state of affairs is both
positive and negative. In the past, problems have primarily
included the accessibility of the talks, the number of
students participating by giving talks, and, most of all,
the attendance by the graduate student body for whom the
colloquium was created.
We see these issues as being the most important for the
success of the graduate colloquium. On the positive side in
general, the talks are tending towards the desired level of
accessibility, with the occasional talk deviating from this
level. This has most likely been accomplished by the
continual mentioning of the idea of what is the right level
of accessibility and the subsequent discretion of the
speaker. We only expect that this will continue to improve
in the future, but it is clear that the idea of
accessibility should continue to be discussed with the
speaker to ensure its maintenance. We have fairly well
achieved our goal to have fairly equal representation of
pure and applied mathematics, especially since our
department is divided so. Often is the case that the
colloquia alternate consistently between the two.
Another important goal is having the majority of the talks
be given by graduate students, a goal which was achieved
during the spring semester but continues to be a problem
during the fall. One idea to aid with this problem is the
idea of a monetary gift as an added incentive to the
speaker, say a gift certificate of $15 dollars to the
bookstore on campus. This would come out to be roughly
$500 for two semesters. The major problem, on the other
hand, is the generally low attendance by the graduate
student body. The general trend is that there is a group of
graduate students who attend regularly, a number of
subgroups who attend only talks they are interested in, and
another major group of students who do not attend at all.
Two stated problems of attending are the late time in the
afternoon (4:30pm) and the number of obligations that
plague graduate students, i.e. homework and project
deadlines, other seminars, teaching, and what not. The time
has now been moved back to 4:00pm, any earlier and we risk
conflict with many other classes, teaching, and seminars.
One novel proposal has been to initiate a social
organization committee whose purpose is to generate more
social functions among the graduate students: if the
graduate students know each other better, then hopefully it
follows that they may be more inclined to hear and support
their giving a talk. The committee has been selected for
the following year (2004-2005). Maybe this combined with
the monetary gift may motivate students enough that we
really improve the attendance.
It was also suggested by a professor that we could modify
the colloquium by moving the time to precede that of the
departmental colloquium and to have occasionally an invited
speaker to the departmental colloquium give, instead, two
talks, one in the first hour to graduate students which is
more accessible and another higher level talk to the
departmental colloquium. We have decided, rather than
change the colloquium time all together, simply to reserve
the time before the departmental colloquium and include
additional colloquia as the situations arise. One important
point is that we still want to have ample time for graduate
students to give colloquia. It is not clear at the moment
how many invited speakers will wish to give two such talks,
but an such occasion will be very welcomed as it is often
the case the departmental colloquia can be very inaccessible
to graduate students in different fields from that of the
talk.
In all, our goal is to strive to bring the colloquium to a
point where it seems healthy enough that it will continually
be a successful program for the graduate student body. This
is the reason that we focus on its problems, whether or not
they have improved, and what is being done to improve them.
One thing that remains clear is that the coordinators of the
colloquium need to assume a VERY active role in choosing and
seeking speakers, discussing with those speakers the
ultimate goals of the colloquium and the audience to whom it
speaks, and doing what they can to ensure its success. At
the present point the graduate colloquium is very sensitive
and the support for it needs to grow for it to become the
colloquium we hope it will become. The highest attendance
ever was recorded consistently during the first year of its
existence during the 1999-2000 school year. However
attendance was required for all first and second years, a
requirement that was rescinded the following year marking a
dramatic decline in attendance. We would rather not
reinstitute the requirement of attendance and instead find a
different approach to making the colloquium appealing enough
that graduate students wish to attend regularly. It seems
the lure of food, which is provided regularly in the 15
minutes prior, is not enough to persuade the majority of the
graduate students. The new approaches hopefully will help
to gain support. It would seem that once the colloquium
attains a large regular attendance, new students might
continually feel as though it is the "place to be". This
means that graduate students of all years must regularly
attend. As it has been repetitively stated in this report,
attendance is our major concern.
MINI-COURSE ON THE "SYNTHETIC GEOMETRY OF THE WEIL-PETERSSON
METRIC"
By Kenneth Bromberg
This spring, through the support of the departments VIGRE
grant, the Unversity of Utah held a mini-course on the
"Synthetic Geometry of the Weil-Petersson Metric". The
course was designed to introduce graduate students to the
Weil-Petersson metric on Teichmulller space. The main
speaker was Jeff Brock of the University of Texas. Brock
gave twelve lectures discussing topics such as the behavior
of geodesics, the visual sphere and connections with
hyperbolic 3-manifolds. Before Brock's talks, introductory
lectures where given by Bob Bell, Mladen Bestvina, Ken
Bromberg and Dan Margalit (all from the University of
Utah). These lectures introduced students to Teichmuller
space and the mapping class group. At the end of the course,
lectures were given on topics related to the course by
Martin Bridgeman (Boston College), Maryam Mirzakhani
(Harvard) and Pete Storm (University of Chicago).
The course was well attended. The local students were: Josh
Thompson, Adam Keenan, Lars Louder, David Ayala, Matt Clay,
Zrinka Despotovitch, and Renzo Cavalieri. Students also
attended from other institutions through the support of the
VIGRE grant: David McReynolds (Texas), Richard Kent (Texas),
Jason Deblois (Texas), Matt Bainbridge (Harvard), Moon
Duchin (Chicago), PJ Lamberson (Columbia), Chris Leininger
(Columbia) and Ilesanmi Adeboye (Michigan). Other non-local
attendees included Kasra Rafi (UCSB) and Zeno Huang
(Oklahoma).
For a number of different reasons the course was a great
success. First and most obviously, the students learned
about this very interesting topic The Weil-Petersson metric
is a very active area of current research and Brock did a
fantastic job of introducing students to the subject.
Second, the size of the course was relatively small compared
to a standard conference, with most of the attendees
graduate students. This gave the students the opportunity to
meet faculty and students at other institutions and to learn
about what they are doing. Students not only spent time
discussing material from the course, but they also talked
with each other about their own research. This is extremely
useful, especially for the students here at Utah, which is
relatively geographically isolated. These kind of
interactions will hopefully lead to future collaborations.
MINI-COURSE ON "CLASSICAL PROBLEMS IN COMMUTATIVE
ALGEBRA"
By Paul Roberts
This summer, from June 7-18, 2004, Florian Enescu and I ran
a mini-course on Classical Problems in Commutative Algebra.
The aim of the course was to introduce graduate students to
a set of conjectures in the field that have been in the
forefront of research for the past thirty years or so. Many
of these conjectures originated from Serre's algebraic
theory of intersection multiplicities, and their status was
summarized in a set of notes by Mel Hochster in 1975. Since
then there has been a lot of progress, and a second aim of
the minicourse was to give an up to date account of what has
been happening since that date.
The course was organized by having an introductory week with
background talks given by young mathematicians. The
speakers were:
- Florian Enescu, University of Utah
- Sandy Spiroff, University of Utah
- Sean Sather-Wagstaff, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
- Claudia Miller, Syracuse University
The idea behind the introductory talks was to give the
students the necessary background as well as to introduce
them to some of the questions we would be discussing later.
The second week was devoted to a more advanced program on
the current state of many of the problems. We had four
speakers:
- Sankar Dutta, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
- Ray Heitmann, University of Texas at Austin
- Mel Hochster, University of Michigan
- Paul Roberts, University of Utah
There were 17 students who participated in the minicourse.
In addition to those supported by the VIGRE grant, there
were several others who obtained support from other sources.
Most of the students were close to finishing their Ph.D., but
a few were in their second or third year. The students
were:
- Ibrahim Al-Ayyoub, New Mexico State University
- Nicholas Baeth, University of Nebraska at Lincoln
- Olgur Celikbas, University of Nebraska at Lincoln
- Erin Chamberlain, University of Utah
- Andrew Crabbe, University of Nebraska at Lincoln
- Christine Cumming, Purdue University
- Hailong Dao, University of Michigan
- Trung Dinh, New Mexico State University
- Bahman Engheta, University of Kansas
- Neil Epstein, University of Kansas
- Ananthnaravan Hariharan, University of Kansas
- Jinjia Li, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
- Frank Moore, University of Nebraska at Lincoln
- Kazuma Shimomoto, University of Utah
- Bart Snapp, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
- Brent Strunk, Purdue University
- Diana White, University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign
There was one more participant. Jan Strooker, a senior
mathematician from the University of Utrecht who has worked
on these problems for many years, decided that the program
was of sufficient interest that he paid his own way to come
for the two weeks.
The program was quite ambitious but, from the reactions of
the students, it appears that they enjoyed the mini-course
and got a lot out of it. We believe that we fulfilled our
aim of introducing graduate students to this important area
of Commutative Algebra.
Back to Table of Contents
The following report is by David Dobson:
A Committee on Diversity was formed in 2003 to promote
diversity issues within the department. The initial
committee consisted of David Dobson (Chair), Ken Golden,
Nick Korevaar, Emily Putnam, and Sarah Strong.
The first initiative of the Committee was to establish a
chapter of the Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) at
the University of Utah. This was accomplished in the early
spring of 2004. Elena Cherkaev serves as faculty mentor to
the group, with financial support provided by the
Department. Students Emily Putnam, Erin Chamberlain, and
Brynja Kohler served as President, Vice President, and
Secretary/Treasurer, respectively for 2003-2004. The group
sponsored two chapter meetings in Spring 2004, with plans
for an enhanced program in 2004-2005. Student response
toward the group has been uniformly positive, and it appears
that this will be a growing, positive influence in the years
to come.
The Chair of the Diversity Committee met with the
University's Vice President for Diversity, Karen Dace.
Dr. Dace provided a wealth of information about diversity
resources on campus, including the Women's Resource Center,
the MESA Society, Summer Research Opportunities through the
Graduate School, and contacts in other departments on campus
who have been particularly successful with diversity efforts
over the past few years. Most of these resources are aimed
at student recruitment and retention, as opposed to faculty
issues. Dr. Dace suggested that two departments on campus
(Psychology and Communications) have recently been
successful with diverse faculty recruitment and would
probably have good ideas for us.
Although perhaps not directly attributable to Diversity
Committee efforts, the Department was successful in
increasing diversity over the past year. Successes include
the appointment of Elena Cherkaev to full Professor (our
only regular faculty hire for the year), the hiring of six
(46%) female postdoctoral associates, and six (38%) female
graduate students.
In summary, the Committee on Diversity has seen some success
in its first year of existence. Plans for the coming year
include expanding the discussion of diversity issues across
the department, more collaboration with on-campus diversity
resource centers and working with the hiring and graduate
committees to recruit more women and minority candidates.
Back to Table of Contents
The following report is by the NSF Site Visit Team:
A site visit team consisting of Hans Kaper (NSF), Abigail
Thompson (University of California, Davis) and Richard
Millman (NSF), visited the Mathematics Department of the
University of Utah on October 15, 2003 for the required
3rd-year assessment of their VIGRE project. The PIs had
been given a list of eight questions addressing VIGRE
issues. The Department Chair (Dr. Graeme Milton) and
members of the VIGRE Management Team were present at the
first meeting of the day. We also met with the graduate
students (about 25), VIGRE postdocs (7), undergraduate
students who did research projects (10), and Dr. David
Chapman, Dean of the Graduate School. What follows are
observations of the site visit team.
The University of Utah project is quite different from most
VIGRE sites. Whereas the basis for most VIGRE sites
revolves around vertical integration in research groups, the
University of Utah's revolves around a sequence of
educational activities for all levels, from 10-year olds
through postdoctoral fellows. This approach has worked
quite well except as noted below. The various communities,
especially graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, feel
very much a part of the process, part of the University,
well mentored, and much involved. All said that they are
benefiting from the University of Utah approach.
How has the integration of research and
education been achieved at all levels?
The VIGRE program was designed to create interactions
between postdocs, graduate students, undergraduates and even
high school students, and it does, with efforts revolving
around the Math Circle, High School Summer Program,
Undergraduate Colloquia, research experiences for
undergraduates, minicourses (including some given by faculty
of other institutions), and modules. These efforts are well
and accurately described in the self assessment.
How has the VIGRE program broadened education?
There is much broadening by colloquia, seminars and courses.
The relevant point here is that the graduate students have a
voice in designing the courses, including those mentioned
above. The fact that the graduate students and postdocs are
very much a part of the undergraduate seminar enables them
to enhance their communication skills and broaden their
background. The self-assessment shows the broadening of the
postdocs. In addition, the postdocs talked about how they
were encouraged to go to other departments (sometimes by
being given names of faculty, etc.) to look for areas of
common interest. There are very pleased with these
interactions.
In what ways has the VIGRE program improved
instructional and communication skills of students and
postdocs?
The primary mechanisms identified by the project to achieve
this goal are through the educational mechanisms above. In
addition, we found uniformly that the faculty was working
with the postdocs and the graduate students on grant
proposals (including a grants seminar), papers, future
job-related issues, and of course the individual theses of
doctoral students. The attention to the undergraduates and
the high school students has forced graduate students and
postdocs to pay attention to the level of their audience in
their professional communications.
What has been the effect of the mentoring programs
that have been developed?
The Mathematics Department appears to have a very positive
atmosphere to promote faculty-student and student-student
mentoring. There are formal reviews of the postdocs, an
excellent approach. As mentioned above, faculty work with
students and postdocs on their written work.
One area that could be improved is for the Department to
come to a uniform understanding (if not agreement) of what
mentoring means to the Mathematics Department at the
University of Utah. There is certainly no "correct"
answer, but a careful and purposeful discussion of the
subject would add much to the experience of the various
constituencies of the Department. We certainly recognize
that mentoring is quite different depending on who is
mentoring and the level of the person being mentored.
How has the VIGRE program promoted recruitment into
the mathematical sciences?
We were pleased to see that the goal of 50 graduate students
had been achieved and that the faculty is confident about
reaching the goal of 300 undergraduate math majors by the
end of the VIGRE grant. The number of women undergraduate
majors is in line with national trends, but the number of
minority and women graduate student isn't and the number of
women postdocs (only 1 or 2 a year out of 11 or 14) most
certainly isn't. We recognize the possible difficulty of
attracting minority faculty and graduate students to Utah.
On the other hand, it is a department that recruits the
prospective faculty, not just the location or demography of
the area.
We urge the Department to think carefully about its
recruitment plans for women faculty, postdocs, and graduate
students. We are requesting a plan to be sent to the site
visit team by November 15. This issue, which was already
brought up during the original site visit (Nov. 20,2000),
is most in need of improvement in the project. As we
mentioned during the site visit, there are institutions that
recruit well for women even though they do not currently
have tenured woman faculty members. The Utah VIGRE
management team could, for example, explore what is done at
other campuses, so that they could increase the number of
talented women at all levels.
We also hope that careful thought will be given to the
reasons why the number of REU experiences for women is so
low compared to that of men. There are many ways to
approach this issue, but the absence of a clear solution
path does not mean that the status quo should be
accepted. We look forward to hearing how the Department
will address the women in REU issue also.
How has the interaction of the several levels of
students and faculty been enhanced?
Education issues have played a central role in these
interactions. There has been much layered interaction in
which the various projects have played a role. This is well
described in their self-assessment.
How has the VIGRE program affected time to degree?
It is really too early to determine the impact on time to
degree. However, it seems clear that providing students
fellowship support in their first year is very effective in
getting students off to a good start.
What has been the dissemination to the mathematical
sciences community of the results of the VIGRE program?
Dissemination has been primarily through the Web and through
presentations at meetings organized by the NSF and
professional societies. There was no evidence that more
pro-active dissemination strategies are being considered.
The Department did reach out to the local mathematical
community in the Utah schools, which is excellent. We hope
that they will find other opportunities at the national
level (e.g. AMS, MAA or SIAM meetings) to show off the
unique program they run.
What other changes has the VIGRE program made
possible?
The change that was most often cited during the site visit
is the increase in both the numbers and the quality of the
educational outreach efforts to the Salt Lake City
educational community. In addition, there will soon be a
five-year cohort of individuals (the Utah graduate students
and postdocs) who have experience in substantive educational
issues at the high school and college level. We feel that
the Utah VIGRE program will have a significant effect on the
relationship between mathematics and K-12 education as these
individuals move into their mathematical careers.
Summary and Recommendation
In summary, the visiting team was favorably impressed by
many of the advances of the project. The impression of the
Site Visit Team can be best described by the way in which
the postdocs responded when asked whether they felt like a
part of the Department. In contrast to the postdocs at the
initial site visit, they answered "yes, absolutely" almost
in unison.
The atmosphere in the Mathematics Department is clearly very
conducive to promoting mentoring and faculty-student and
student-student interactions. Given that, the general
approach in the Department is to let mentoring occur
naturally. As mentioned above, we urge the Department to
think globally about the issue of mentoring, but they are
clearly doing it well now.
The leadership of the Mathematics Department, both past and
present, appears to have a very good working relationship
with the members of the Department, exchanging ideas and
working out agreeable allocations of project resources.
(The postdocs commented on how well this works for them
also.) We applaud the dedication and enthusiasm of the
VIGRE management team for their successful efforts and
especially cite Dr. Klaus Schmitt for the care and
efficiency in the Department's preparations for the site
visit and for the clarity of the documents sent to us prior
to, during, and after the visit. We have no concerns about
the quality of the program, even though two key players are
on leave or in the process of leaving the University through
retirement. We look forward to seeing their recruitment
plans.
Recommendation: The site visit team recommends
that the project be funded for the remaining two years of
the five-year award.
Hans Kaper, NSF
Richard Millman, NSF
Abigail Thompson, University of California, Davis
10/23/03 FINAL
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