Each year,
the section recognizes one outstanding teacher of collegiate mathematics with
an award named in honor of Burton W. Jones, a life long advocate of excellence
in teaching at all levels. In addition to an honorarium, a certificate and an
invitation to deliver the opening lecture at the next Section Meeting, the
recipient becomes the section’s nominee for the Deborah and Franklin Haimo Awards
for Distinguished
College or University
Teaching of Mathematics. These national awardees (at most three) are honored at
the MAA winter meeting with a certificate and $1000 check. All nominators also receive a certificate of
in recognition of their efforts to support the section mission of promoting
excellence in teaching; nominators and nominees both receive free meeting
registration at the next section meeting. To begin the nomination process for
an outstanding teacher that you know, simply submit the one-page nomination
form (available at our website: http://www-math.cudenver.edu/~maa-rm
and in this newsletter) by 1 December 2009. Complete nomination
materials (described on the website) are due 15 January 2010.
Plans are under way for the 14th
Colorado Mathematics Awards Ceremony and Reception to be held on Tuesday, May
12 at the Grant - Humphreys Mansion in Denver.
At the school level we'll be recognizing the top ten participants on
MATHCOUNTS, the AMC 8, 10, and 12 contests, and outstanding members of the
Colorado American Regions Mathematics League team. At the collegiate level
we'll be recognizing the top Putnam Exam team, the top three Putnam scorers,
and the top team(s) on the Mathematical Contest in Modeling.
We
are always looking for sponsors, and are appreciative of the support that the
Rocky Mountain Section has provided over the years for this event. This year,
finding funding has become even more difficult. The CCTM, one of our main
sponsors, has decided on a one-year moratorium for granting requests. If you
have any suggestions for possible sources of funding, please contact me at gibbs_d@fortlewis.edu.
Dick Gibbs, Fort Lewis College
Putnam coordinators at the
participating schools please send Dick Gibbs at
gibbs_d@fortlewis.edu the top three scores and their team score. No
names are requested at this time. When we know the top three scores and the top
team score we will contact the schools for the names.
I knew it would happen…the dreaded
email telling me that the article for the RMS spring newsletter was due. It’s
sort of like getting a letter from the IRS—you just would rather not open it.
But there it was the innocent looking email from Linda in my inbox. Writing the
article had been on my “to-do” list since early January. I just thought if I
kept ignoring it, then maybe some cosmic event would occur so that I wouldn’t
be sitting here typing this at the 11th hour. It didn’t turn out
that way, but at least I have one paragraph done.
The problem with the Chair’s article
is there is little guidance about what should be in it. I could tell you about the spring meeting,
but the newsletter is already filled with information about it. I must say that
I can’t wait. Barb Moskal has done an amazing job with the program and it looks
to be a fantastic event. I can’t encourage you to submit an abstract since the
deadline has passed. However, there will be an outstanding array of contributed
and keynote talks. I am looking forward to the announcement of the Burton W.
Jones Teaching Award and the keynote address by last year’s winner Steven Janke (Colorado College).
In addition, keynote addresses by Gilbert
Strang (MIT) and MAA First Vice President, Elizabeth Mayfield (Hood
College) promise to be
exciting and thought-provoking. I expect the meeting in Golden to be one of the
largest in recent years and I am very excited by the anticipated increase in
participation by the K-12 community due to financial support from Exxon-Mobil.
Please look over the meeting website and plan to attend as much as possible. I
would particularly like to encourage you to attend the banquet and the business
meeting. I’m looking forward to seeing everyone April 17 – 18.
Another feature of the Chair’s
letter is to inform the section membership of happenings from the joint
meetings and important news from the MAA. Fortunately, our section Governor, Kyle Riley, was also in DC for the
joint meetings. He attended both the Governor’s meeting and he joined me at the
section officer’s meeting. His article appears in this newsletter and his account
is much more informative than mine. However, I can comment on the new
council/committee structure of the MAA. There has been a major re-shuffling and
consolidation of committees and sub-committees of the MAA. At the JMM, I took over as chair of the MAA
Committee on Professional Development. At some point in the near future I will
be asking section members for suggestions on how the MAA can better serve its
members through MAA professional development opportunities. Chairing this
committee is an exciting opportunity and the committee membership is a diverse
group of mathematicians that represent a wide array of institutions.
There should be a transition
sentence here, but I am at a loss. Anyway, I was thinking about quantitative
literacy because I am involved with assessing it at the Air Force Academy. I
figured I could write about quantitative literacy (QL) in a mathematics
organization’s newsletter and nobody would mind. I’m not exactly sure what QL
is. Alas, saying “I know it when I see it” does not form a good basis for
assessing it. Still, I am certain that QL for a college graduate is somewhat
different than QL for an average citizen. It is even more interesting that a
school that awards every graduate a Bachelor of Science degree feels the need to
assess QL. It is certainly one of the focal points for post secondary education
in the 21st century. Of the many attributes that can be used to
describe QL, one central tenant seems to be a meaningful appreciation for
scale. As we all know, numbers come in all shapes and sizes (OK, just sizes)
and getting a handle on the number of atoms that fit on the head of a pin
versus the diameter of an atom is not so easy. A good example currently
dominating the news is the size of the proposed economic stimulus package.
As I write this, Congress just
approved a plan with a $787 billion price tag. From a QL stand point this is a
number that deserves some attention. The media has reported this number on the
range from the right size to fix the economy to an astronomically large number
that can scarcely be imagined. Astronomical
is a good term since it is about twice the estimated number of stars in the
Milky Way. One can only hope that 1/10 of one percent is earmarked for the
mathematical sciences (I’ll let you do the math). However, I think the best way
to appreciate the size of this number has been overlooked by the news media.
Simply take your favorite 15 math books from your shelf. Now, 787 billion is a
little more than half of the number of distinct ways to arrange those books.
Now put them back on the shelf any way you like.
Respectfully
submitted,
Mike
Brilleslyper, USAFA
Chair, Rocky
Mountain Section
I was able to attend the Board of
Governors Meeting on January 4, 2009 in Washington
DC. The first thing I would like
to mention is that I was able to visit our section brick! As you may recall,
the MAA had recently finished renovating the Carriage House at the MAA
Headquarters so it could be used as a meeting location for workshops and a variety
of gatherings for members of the MAA. To sustain the Carriage House, the MAA
initiated an endowment that is dedicated to this facility and this type of
professional development. Our section was one of many sections that contributed
to this cause and our brick is proudly displayed among the other generous
donors. I did see a few other familiar names from the section and this facility
is a wonderful building that is in an ideal location.
The MAA Board of Governors Meeting
was very informative, but I will try to boil things down to just a few items.
The MAA is hard at work trying to provide resources that will be of use to the
mathematics community. The MAA website, http://www.maa.org/,
has a wealth of information: links to other sections, the combined membership
list, professional development, student chapter newsletter, Mathematical
Digital Library (MathDL), publications,
book reviews, and so much more! The MAA
is not immune to the economic crunch that has impacted everyone and the
national office has implemented a comprehensive plan to keep the MAA a lean
professional association that can still deliver valuable services to the
members. One change I should mention is that the national office is
discontinuing the practice of offering free memberships to undergraduates that
speak at a section meeting. There were several reasons for this move: across
all sections for all section meetings this did represent a significant amount
of money, the MAA has been aggressive in providing more opportunities for
students to speak by generating support for undergraduate conferences in
mathematics, and the data they have gathered suggested that free MAA membership
was not a significant factor to a student speaking at a section meeting. I was
disappointed to learn of this news, but it is also evident that the MAA is
working to move more services to online delivery and this should make it
possible for undergraduate students to have access to very affordable version
of online membership. Student membership is currently $30 and it is very
difficult to beat a deal like that. Another cost saving move is that the MAA
newsletter (MAA Focus) will be moving
to six issues per year. However, this will also translate into issues that are
larger, packed with even better articles, and more color.
It so happens that I also have good
news to offer from the Board meeting. MAA membership is up for the first time
in a couple of years and one area of growth is international membership. The
national meetings have also enjoyed a great deal of success with the last
Mathfest in Madison having a record attendance, plus the Joint Mathematics
Meeting in DC was on track for record attendance with over 6,000 people
attending the conference. Future national meetings:
Mathfest, Portland, OR, August 6-8, 2009
Joint Mathematics Meeting, San
Francisco, CA,
January 13-16, 2010
Mathfest, Pittsburg,
PA, August 5-7, 2010
This
summer, the MAA is going to continue with their professional Enhancement
Programs (PREP) and you can find a complete calendar at http://www.maa.org/prep/ . I am really
looking forward to our section meeting at the Colorado School of Mines and hope
to see you there.
Respectfully
submitted,
Kyle
Riley, SDSMT
Governor, Rocky
Mountain Section
Colorado State
University - Pueblo
With two faculty members on
sabbatical leave (Jim Louisell for
AY08-09 and Janet Barnett for CY09),
the department is hosting Wojciech
Kosek and Hashim Saber as visiting associate professors of mathematics this
academic year. Wojciech is well-known in the section through his previous visiting
position at Colorado
College, where he served
as MAA liaison; he is also the author of Calculus for the Forgetful: How to Understand More
and Memorize Less, a concise book on single variable calculus. Hashim
is helping department members Bruce
Lundberg and Darren Funk to reinvigorate our Math-Physics Club by meeting with
students on a regular basis for games, puzzles, magic tricks, movies and
food.
The department is also currently in
the midst of an external search for a new department chair, and gratefully
thanks Paul Chacon for his many
years of service in this role.
Our Math Learning
Center (MLC) is back under “old” management, with Tammy Watkins stepping
into the supervisory role after director Mary
Middleton accepted a teaching post in South Korea. Despite unexpected
financial difficulties, the MLC continues to provide drop-in assistance for all
entry level math classes and select physics courses, in addition to housing our
Group Learning Program for College Algebra. We have also launched a Student Success in Mathematics Task Force chaired by Jonathan Poritz to study issues related to student success and
retention in mathematics, with an initial focus on remedial and lower division
mathematics course. Information from all
schools in the region about their learning assistance centers or other
initiatives related to these issues is heartedly invited by the Task
Force.
In
student news, thirteen of our senior math majors took the MFAT in December
2008, resulting in an average score above the 90th percentile as
compared with the 260 institutional scores from 2004-2008. Among these thirteen
was prize-winning author Cole McGee, who placed second in the 2008
National History of Mathematics Paper
Competition sponsored by HOM-SIGMAA for his paper Jean le Rond D’Alembert:
Mathematician, Philosophe, and Man of Letters (posted at
www.homsigmaa.org/news08.pdf ). Cole also
participated in the Summer 2008 Hong Kong REU co-sponsored by Colorado School
in Mines; he follows graduate Michael
Gilbert as the second CSU-Pueblo student to complete that program.
South Dakota School of Mines
and Technology
We are
pleased with the news that both Travis
Kowalski and Karen Braman have
been approved by the campus for the promotion to Associate Professor. In
addition, Travis was selected as an organizer for one of the undergraduate
activity session at the next MAA Mathfest in Portland, Oregon.
University of Northern
Colorado
Jodie Novak has been awarded a
five-year, $5 million grant from the National Science Foundation for the Math
Teacher Leadership Center (TLC), a center for mathematics teaching and mathematics
teacher professional development. The Math TLC works to create a collaborative
master’s degree program with the University
of Wyoming that provides
financial support for current secondary math teachers to work towards an
advanced degree in Mathematics with an emphasis in teaching. It also creates a
Mathematics Teacher Leadership Program that financially supports upper
elementary, middle and high school teachers to develop expertise in teaching
teachers. The center will conduct research to assess the impact of these
programs on teachers’ mathematical understanding, pedagogical content
knowledge, and cultural competencies for teaching the diverse students in Colorado and Wyoming.
Dr. Novak was assisted by Mathematical Sciences faculty Shandy Hauk,
Co-Principal Investigator Robert Powers, and Bill Blubaugh.
We are pleased to report that Shandy Hauk
received the college-wide Excellence in Scholarship Award from the College of Natural and Health Sciences at
UNC.
An undergraduate UNC math major, Bryan Shourd,
is attending “Math in Moscow,”
a 15-week program at the Independent University of Moscow, a small, prestigious
Russian university for future research mathematicians. Brian is one of
only nine students from around the world selected for the highly coveted
program’s spring semester. He’ll be joined by undergraduate and graduate
students from Harvard, Stanford, the Polytechnic Institute of New York, Smith College,
the University of British Columbia and Luther College.
Brian was also awarded a $7500 American Mathematical Society Scholarship to
help with the travel and living expenses.
The 17th Annual UNC Math Contest for
students in grades 7-12 had over 1900 participants. The first round was
delivered on-line this year in November and provided students throughout the
state the opportunity to participate. The top 179 students were invited to
campus for the final round on January 31, 2009. The top 25 winners will
be honored, along with their parents, at a banquet in early April that is hosted
by the director of the Math Contest, Richard Grassl.
Hortensia Soto-Johnson, Cathleen Craviotto, and Ricardo Diaz
are organizing the second annual Las Chicas de Matematicas, a Summer Math Camp
for young women. The free one-week residential camp will introduce mathematically
talented high school girls to the topics of geometry, abstract algebra, and
combinatorics through problem-solving and collaborative learning. The camp will
be on the UNC campus from June 14 to June 19, 2009. For more information,
contact:
Hortensia.Soto@unco.edu.
University of Wyoming
This summer's Rocky Mountain Mathematics Consortium Summer
School at UW is entitled Recent Developments in Dynamic Equations on Time
Scales. The main speakers will be Martin Bohner from Missouri University
of Science and Technology, and Allan Person from the University
of Nebraska, Lincoln.
The RMMC summer school gives
graduate students and faculty a chance to learn about a new area mathematics in
a two-week workshop setting. Money is available to help with expenses for both
faculty and graduate students, and you can also receive graduate course
credit. The dates are June 8-19, 2009. More information is available at:
http://www.uwyo.edu/rmmc/rmmc2009.asp.
Is news from your
school missing?
Send your
news to your department liaison now with a request to forward it to the Linda Sundbye, Newsletter Editor for inclusion in
the next issue.
Students are
invited to participate in the MAA Sectional meeting at the Colorado School of
Mines in Golden, CO, April 17-18, 2009. There will be student sessions in which
you can attend, as well as a student poster session.
You may also present a poster. Bring
a poster relating to your independent study, senior seminar, modeling contest,
etc. Anything with mathematical content will be appropriate. Prizes will be
awarded in categories to be determined.
Ask a faculty
member at your institution about the meeting and/or contact me at lienert_c@fortlewis.edu.
Carl
Lienert
Section Student
Activity Coordinator
Math Awareness Month is only a few
months away. Initiated in 1986 to increase public understanding of, and
appreciation for, mathematics, this annual event highlights the relevance of
mathematics to a particular area of scientific endeavor.
This year, the MAA, American
Mathematical Society (AMS), Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics
(SIAM), and American Statistical Association (ASA) have jointly proclaimed that
the theme of Mathematics Awareness Month - April 2009 - shall be "Mathematics and Climate."
The event puts the spotlight on
mathematical aspects of various climate-related issues: How long will the
summer Arctic sea ice pack survive? Are hurricanes and other severe weather
events getting stronger? How much will sea levels rise as ice sheets melt? How
do human activities affect climate change? How is global climate monitored?
Calculus, differential equations, numerical analysis, probability, statistics,
and other areas of mathematics play key roles in answers to these questions and
in helping scientists better understand oceans, the atmosphere, and polar ice
caps, as well as their complex interrelationships and interactions.
6th Annual Pikes Peak
Regional Undergraduate
Mathematics Conference
University of Colorado
Colorado Springs
Saturday, February 28, 2009
The focus of this annual conference
is to give undergraduate mathematics students an opportunity to present their
work in a professional, supportive setting. It is also an occasion for students
to become acquainted with other students from the region, and to learn more
about the mathematics profession, including graduate school and career
opportunities.
Undergraduates from throughout the Rocky Mountain
region are encouraged to attend, and especially encouraged to make a
presentation. Presentation topics could include the results of classroom,
independent study, REU or other research projects. Both research and expository
topics are welcome. Undergraduates will discuss their research topics during
15-minute presentations. The conference also features a keynote speaker and a
panel discussion, giving participants the opportunity to learn more about the
mathematics profession, including graduate school and career opportunities.
Registration is free for all
participants, and includes a buffet lunch. Participants traveling from outside
the Colorado Springs
region may be partially reimbursed for travel expenses, depending on
availability of funds. It would be a tremendous help to provide your own travel
and lodging if at all possible.
For more information, contact Greg Morrow at gmorrow@uccs.edu or Stefan Erickson at
stefan.erickson@coloradocollege.edu.
As mathematics instructors, it is
natural for us to try to provide students with clear and precise presentations,
both in our teaching and in the textbooks we select. But just as water filtration, intended to
remove impurities, can remove healthy minerals and interesting tastes, efforts
to remove potential impediments to learning can strip a subject of its context,
motivation and direction.
One means of restoring these
ingredients is to go back to the source from which the subject originally
sprang, which is precisely what the curriculum development project Learning Discrete Mathematics and Computer
Science via Primary Historical Sources aims to do. With funding from the
NSF Division of Undergraduate Education, the interdisciplinary project team of
seven mathematicians and computer scientists at Colorado State
University–Pueblo and New Mexico State University is creating and testing a set
of student projects – based entirely on original source readings – for a
variety of topics in discrete mathematics, broadly defined to include courses
such as mathematical logic and abstract algebra.
Designed to capture the spark of
discovery and motivate subsequent lines of inquiry, each student project is
built around excerpts from primary sources close to or representing the
discovery of a key concept. Through guided reading and activities, students
explore the mathematics of the original discovery and develop their own
understanding of the subject. To place the source in context, a student project
also provides biographical information about its author, and historical
background about the problem with which the author was concerned. Original source authors represented in these
projects include Archimedes, Boole, Cantor, Euler, Leibniz, Pascal, Turing,
Veblen, and von Neumann, writing on topics such as mathematical induction,
logic, finite sums of powers, graph theory, transfinite arithmetic, binary
arithmetic, Boolean algebra, combinatorics, algorithm design, computability,
and decidability. All projects are available at http://www.math.nmsu.edu/hist_projects/discrete-projects.pdf,
along with further detail about our pedagogical approach.
Mathematics and computer science instructors who are teaching courses
that involve discrete mathematics topics are cordially invited to collaborate
with our team by site-testing projects we have developed in your own
classrooms, or by working with a grant team member to develop a project of your
own. Travel funds
for consulting fees and for visits to CSU-Pueblo and/or to NMSU, or to have a
grant team member visit your home institution, are available now through the
end of the grant in December 2011. For more information, please contact Janet Barnett at:
janet.barnett@colostate-pueblo.edu
.
Daluss Siewert
Black Hills State University
Daluss Siewert received his B.S in Mathematics from
the University of Alaska Anchorage in 1994, his M.S. in mathematics
from the University of Colorado at Boulder in
1996, and his Ph.D. in applied mathematics from the University
of Colorado at Denver in 2000. Since then he has been on the
faculty at Black Hills
State University
where he holds the rank of associate professor. During his nine years as a
faculty member, his primary role has been teaching remedial through senior
undergraduate level mathematics courses. However, during this time he has also
had several research papers in combinatorial matrix theory published in a
peer-reviewed journal and this research has been presented at six national and
regional meetings. During this time he has also taken the lead in the
department on assessment and accreditation of the mathematics teacher
preparation program.
Daluss is actively involved in the MAA. He served as
the program chair of the regional meeting at Black Hills State
University in 2008 and he
was invited by the MAA President, Joe Gallian, to serve a three-year term on
the national MAA Committee on Undergraduate Student Activities and Chapters
(CUSAC). As a part of his service on this committee, he will be serving as a
co-organizer of the undergraduate student paper sessions at MathFest in Portland in 2009 and in Pittsburgh in 2010. Also, through his work on
this committee, he was instrumental in getting a member of our section invited
to conduct an invited student activity session at MathFest in Portland in 2009. Daluss has been the advisor
of the active BHSU Math Club/Student Chapter of the MAA for the past 8 years
and has brought several students to the regional meeting nearly every year.
Candidate Statement:
I became involved in the Rocky Mountain Section of
the MAA as a graduate student when a faculty member at CU-Denver asked me to
present the results of a class project at the regional meeting in 1998. I
quickly saw the value of participating in MAA and, in particular, getting
students involved in the regional meeting. I would like to continue to foster
both undergraduate and graduate student involvement in the MAA. Specifically, I
would like to see our section continue travel support for graduate students who
present at our section meetings. If one becomes involved in the MAA as a
graduate student, active involvement in the MAA during their career will likely
follow. My experience is a case in point. The MAA regional meetings are not
only a great place to present your ideas and research results, they are
invaluable in helping one expand and grow ones perspective on teaching and
learning. I would also like to encourage all members of the Rocky Mountain
Section to not only be active in regional meetings, but in national meetings
and activities as well. I would like to make the Rocky Mountain Section even
more visible on the national level than it already is. This visibility may lead
to expanded professional opportunities and recognition for the members of our
section. If elected, I will support the activities of our section in any way I
can and will strive to continue the strong leadership of our past chairs.
Stan Payne,
University of Colorado at Denver
Ph.D. 1966 from Florida
State University; I
was a faculty member at Miami University (Ohio)
from 1966 to 1986 (reaching full professor with tenure by 1974). After
visiting CU - Denver
during 1984 - 1986, I accepted the position of full professor with tenure
there in fall of 1986. I served as Department Chair for three years in
middle 1990's and Associate Chair off and on over several different
semesters. I have had three Ph.D. students graduate (by spring of 2009)
with two more currently working on degree. Over the years in Colorado I have been
only mildly involved with the Rocky Mountain Section, but would like to
increase my involvement.
Registration is now open for the
MAA’s 2009 series of Professional Enhancement Program (PREP) workshops. There are
online workshops, onsite workshops and workshops offered at the summer MathFest
in Portland, OR in August. For more information, visit:
http://www.maa.org/prep/
Join MAA members for a tour of Egypt, May 20 – June 1, 2009. For
more information and pricing, visit: http://www.maa.org/egypt_trip/
or contact Lisa Kolbe at lkolbe@maa.org
(202-293-1170.
Colorado School of Mines to Host 2009 Meeting
Planning for the 2009 Rocky Mountain
Section Spring Meeting, sponsored by the ExxonMobil
Corporation and held at the Colorado
School of Mines on April 17 and 18,
2009, is well underway. The overriding theme of this conference is
“Increasing Diversity in the Mathematics Pipeline.” Consistent with this theme,
we are inviting mathematics teachers at all levels to contribute and attend,
middle school, high school and college. Special sessions are being held in the
following areas: 1) History of Mathematics, 2) Programs for Middle School and
High School Students and Preservice and Inservice Teachers, 3) K-16+ Challenges
and Connections, 4) Mathematics Education Research, 5) Graduate and
Undergraduate Student Research, and 6) Pure, Applied Mathematics, Number Theory
and Geometry.
This meeting will officially open at 12:45 pm. on April 17, 2009, with an address by our most recent Burton W. Jones Distinguished Teaching Award Recipient, Dr. Steven Janke, Professor of Mathematics and Computer Science at Colorado College. Dr. Janke was appointed as Verner Z. Reed Professor of Natural Science from 1997 – 2000 and he coauthored the text “Introduction to Linear Models and Statistical Inference” (published by Wiley) with his colleague, Fred Tinsley, in 2005. Currently, he is interested in complex system behaviors as applied to environmental problems. Dr. Janke’s talk, “The Traveling Salesperson Problem: A cross-disciplinary example within the mathematical sciences,” will outline the Traveling Salesperson Problem including history, graph theory, computer science, and recent progress.
This year’s MAA National Invited
Banquet and Keynote Speaker will be Dr. Elizabeth Mayfield, Hood
College, Frederick, Maryland.
Dr. Mayfield is the First Vice President of the MAA and a professor of
Mathematics at Hood
College. Her research
areas include underwater acoustics, mathematics pedagogy, and the history of
mathematics. She has received numerous awards for both teaching and research.
The title of Dr. Mayfield’s talk at the Friday night banquet is, “A Locally
Compact REU: Involving students in research in the history of mathematics.” Her
keynote address on Saturday is “Women and Mathematics in the Time of Euler.”
Both of these talks will address the important historical role that women have
played in mathematics with an emphasis on the time of Euler.
An
ExxonMobil Sponsored featured address on Friday afternoon will be presented by Dr.
Gil Strang, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Dr. Strang is a
professor of mathematics at MIT and an Honorary Fellow of Balliol College. He
has received numerous awards for both teaching and scholarship and is widely
published with authorship on seven textbooks. The title of his talk is “The
Beauty of Linear Algebra.” This talk will address the importance of matrices in
teaching and research, including the "graph Laplacian matrix" and
circulants.
The featured
workshop, “An Investigation into the Use of Case Studies in the Training of
In-service and Pre-service Middle School Math Teachers,” which will precede
this meeting on Friday, April 17, 2009, at 8:45 am, will be presented by
National Science Foundation (NSF) funded West Texas Middle School Math
Partnership (WTMSMP). Workshop presenters include Drs. Gary Harris, Jerry
Dwyer, Zenaida Aguirre-Munoz, Tara Stevens, Juli D’Ann Ratheal and
Warren Koepp. Participants in this workshop will experience first-hand the
use of case studies (realistic in-class scenarios) as tools to provide teachers
with strategies for enhancing their students’ mathematical self-efficacy; while
at the same time, increasing their own cultural sensitivity and strengthening
their own conceptual understanding of the basic mathematics taught in middle
school. This workshop should be of interest to school mathematics teachers as
well as university instructors and researchers who are involved with the
mathematics preparation of future teachers. The cost for this workshop is
$5.00.
The Colorado School of Mines
Mathematical and Computer Sciences Department is pleased to host the section
meeting in the Spring of 2009. Many of you have not yet visited our beautiful
campus, which is nestled in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, Golden, Colorado. We invite you
and your students to attend the 2009 Rocky Mountain Section Meeting at the
Colorado School of Mines.
Registration for this meeting is
available at: http://mcs.mines.edu/About_Us/Registration.html.
The deadline for abstract submission has passed and was very successful. Only a
few sessions remain open. If you missed the submission deadline and wish to
participate as a speaker, you may contact bmoskal@mines.edu.
Additional submissions will be considered based on space available within a
session, and on first come first serve requests within an open session. For
more information, please visit the conference website at: http://www.mines.edu/Academic/macs/About_Us/MAAMeeting.htmlPage.html.
Graduate and undergraduate students are welcome to submit additionally
abstracts for our student poster session (send to bmoskal@mines.edu with MAA-POSTER in
heading). We conclude by thanking the ExxonMobil Corporation for sponsoring the session breaks,
reception, and the registration of pre-college mathematics teachers and for
sponsoring the ExxonMobil Corporation sponsored address by Dr. Strang.
2008 Burton
W. Jones Distinguished Teaching Award Recipient
Steven Janke earned his Ph.D. from the University of California
at Berkeley in 1982 after spending his undergraduate
years at University of California at Santa Barbara
and at the University of Sussex in England. He currently is a
professor at Colorado
College, a liberal arts
institution, where he teaches a range of courses from probability and
statistics (his graduate work) to computer science and environmental science.
He was appointed as Verner Z. Reed Professor of Natural Science from 1997 –
2000 and has served as chair of the Mathematics and Computer Science Department
for two terms during his time at Colorado
College. In 2005, he
coauthored the text “Introduction to
Linear Models and Statistical Inference” (published by Wiley) with his
colleague, Fred Tinsley. Currently, he is interested in complex system
behaviors as applied to environmental problems.
MAA National Featured Speaker
Elizabeth Mayfield (Betty) is the current First Vice
President of the MAA. She earned a B.A. in mathematics from the University of North Carolina
at Greensboro and an M.S. and Ph.D. from the University of Rhode Island. Between undergraduate
and graduate school, she taught high school mathematics. Since 1979, Dr.
Mayfield has served on the faculty of Hood
College in Frederick, Maryland,
where she has chaired the mathematics department since 1999. She has been
awarded the College's Mortar Board Excellence in Teaching Award and its
Laughlin Award for Professional Achievement, and was inducted into the campus
Ionic Society in recognition of outstanding service. She has enjoyed doing
research, often with students or colleagues in other disciplines, in underwater
acoustics, mathematics pedagogy, and the history of mathematics. She became
involved in the MAA first in the Maryland-DC-Virginia Section, where she served
as newsletter editor, chair, and governor, and was the 2001 recipient of its
Award for Distinguished
College or University
Teaching of Mathematics. She has served on the Committee on Sections, the
Centennial Planning Committee, and as chair of the Committee on Undergraduate
Student Activities and Chapters and of the Search Committee for Associate
Secretary. She is also proud to be a consultant for Project NExT.
ExxonMobil Sponsored Speaker
Gilbert Strang (Gil) was an undergraduate at
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and a Rhodes Scholar at Balliol College,
Oxford. His
Ph.D. was from the University
of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and since then he
has taught at MIT. He has been a Sloan Fellow and a Fairchild Scholar and is a
Fellow of the American
Academy of Arts and
Sciences. He is a Professor of Mathematics at MIT and an Honorary Fellow of
Balliol College. Professor Strang has published a monograph with George Fix,
"An Analysis of the Finite Element Method", and 7 textbooks: 1)
Introduction to Linear Algebra (1993,
1998, 2003), 2) Linear Algebra and Its Applications (1976, 1980, 1988, 2005),
3) Introduction to Applied Mathematics (1986), 4) Calculus (1991), 5) Wavelets
and Filter Banks, with Truong Nguyen (1996), 6) Linear Algebra, Geodesy, and
GPS, with Kai Borre (1997) and 7) Computational Science and Engineering (2007).
He was the President of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics
(SIAM) during 1999 and 2000, and Chair of the Joint Policy Board for
Mathematics. He received the von Neumann Medal of the US Association for
Computational Mechanics, and the Henrici Prize for applied analysis. The first
Su Buchin Prize from the International Congress of Industrial and Applied
Mathematics, and the Haimo Prize from the Mathematical Association of America
were awarded for his contributions to teaching around the world. His home page
is math.mit.edu/~gs/ and his linear algebra lectures are available at
ocw.mit.edu (mathematics/18.06).
The Traveling Salesperson Problem: A Cross-Disciplinary Example within the Mathematical Sciences
2008 Burton W. Jones Distinguished Teaching Award Recipient
Friday 1:00-1:45 pm
Student Center, Ballroom A
Steven Janke, Colorado College
The Traveling Salesperson Problem (TSP) is a well-known,
simply stated problem which asks for the shortest “tour” through all the
vertices of a graph. Its relevance in many undergraduate courses highlights the
need in many problems for perspectives from several areas of the mathematical
sciences. This talk will outline the TSP including some history, some graph
theory, some computer science, and some glimpses of recent progress with the
problem. Apart from being an interesting and enduring problem, it perhaps
argues for the blurring of lines between the mathematical disciplines.
The Beauty of Linear Algebra
ExxonMobil Sponsored Speaker
Friday 5:00-6:00 pm
Student Center, Ballroom A
Gilbert Strang, MIT
Linear algebra is full of interesting problems. Where calculus is all about one operator and its inverse (the derivative and the integral), linear algebra offers a great variety of matrices: symmetric, orthogonal, triangular, Markov, positive definite, Hadamard, and (very important) tridiagonal. All of us could add to that list. I will speak about particular matrices in teaching and research — including the "graph Laplacian matrix" and circulants.
A Locally Compact REU: Involving Students in Research in the History of Mathematics
Friday Banquet Featured Speaker
Elizabeth Mayfield, Hood College
In the Summer of 2007 (the Year of Euler), a colleague and I
spent eight weeks working with four of our undergraduate students, exploring
the topic of women and mathematics in the time of Euler. Our summer included
field trips and invited speakers as well as trips to the library and working
math problems together. It culminated with a trip to MathFest, where all of the
students gave talks in the undergraduate paper sessions. I hope to convince you
that involving students in this kind of research is fun, exciting, and
absolutely doable.
Women and Mathematics in the Time of Euler
MAA National Speaker
Saturday 9:00- 9:45 am
Student Center, Ballroom A
Elizabeth Mayfield, Hood College
We will examine some female contemporaries of Leonhard Euler
(1707 - 1783) —some famous, some not so famous. We will also look at mathematics
that was written both by and for women in the time of Euler.
An Investigation into the Use of Case Studies in the Training of In-Service
and Pre-Service Middle School Math Teachers.
Friday 8:45-10:45 am
Student Center, Room 236
Gary Harris, Jerry Dwyer, Zenaida Aguirre-Munoz, Tara Stevens, Warren
Koepp, Juli D’Ann Ratheal, Texas Tech
The West Texas Middle School Math Partnership (WTMSMP) was developed to
enhance middle level mathematics teachers’ knowledge of conceptual mathematics,
student mathematics self-efficacy, and cultural sensitivity to positively
impact student math achievement in West Texas.
WTMSMP is funded by the National Science Foundation’s Mathematics and Science
Partnerships program. Our workshop presenters will include, Gary Harris, Jerry Dwyer, Zenaida
Aguirre-Munoz, Tara Stevens, and Warren
Koepp, who are the investigators for WTMSMP. Participants in this workshop
will experience first-hand the use of such case studies (realistic in-class
scenarios) as tools to provide teachers with strategies for enhancing their
students’ mathematics self-efficacy; while at the same time, increasing their
own cultural sensitivity and strengthening their own conceptual understanding
of the basic mathematics taught in middle school. This workshop is of interest
to middle and high school mathematics teachers as well as university
instructors and researchers who are involved with the mathematics preparation
of future teachers.
Has tenure ever been threatened on
your campus? Have you ever been given a curriculum developed without discipline
expertise and told to implement that curriculum in the next semester? Have you
ever developed effective student support systems and had those systems
reassigned or taken over by another department on campus? Have you ever felt
that shared governance is window dressing for a hierarchical decision making
process at your institution? Has trust between faculty and administration
deteriorated to a point that interaction is destructive? Do you know of faculty
members who have left your institution because of the current political
environment? If any or all of these questions describes situations you have
faced on your campus, then please register for and come to the Department
Chairs and MAA Liaisons luncheon from 11:00am-12:30pm on Friday April 17, 2009
at the Golden Hotel prior to the MAA-RMS spring
conference at the Colorado School of Mines. If you are unable to come,
please ensure your institution has a representative present.
On April 14, 2007, the Rocky
Mountain Section of the Mathematical Association of America voted to endorse
the AAUP
Statement of Academic Freedom . As an agenda item at the Department Chairs
and Liaisons luncheon, Janet
Barnett and Jeff
Berg will guide discussion to identify the magnitude of issues and
environments that infringe upon our collective academic freedom. The intent of
the agenda item is to move past identification to current and potential
solutions. If warranted, the discussion will continue at an informal lunch on
Saturday April 18, 2007 after the conference.
Students are invited to participate
in the MAA Sectional meeting on April17 and 18, 2009, to be held at the
Colorado School of Mines, Golden, CO. There are student sessions in which
students will give talks and there will be a poster session as well. Abstract
submissions for the poster session are still underway and should be sent to lienert_c@fortlewis.edu. Bring a poster related
to your independent study, senior seminar, modeling contest, etc. Anything with
mathematical content is appropriate. Prizes will be awarded in categories to be
determined. All student registrations are free. To register, see: http://mcs.mines.edu/About_Us/Registration.html
We would like to invite middle
school and high school teachers to fully participate in the MAA Sectional
meeting on April 17 and 18, 2009. Thirty teacher registrations will be paid by
the ExxonMobil Corporation. To register, see: http://mcs.mines.edu/About_Us/Registration.html
Please visit the conference homepage at: http://mcs.mines.edu/About_Us/MAAMeeting.html
for information about lodging, registration, meeting updates
and campus map.
Registration for the meeting is now open. Register at: http://mcs.mines.edu/About_Us/Registration.html
Online registration will close 14 days prior to the meeting.
Friday, April 17
8:45 – 10:45 Workshop:
An Investigation into the Use
of Case Studies in the Training of In-Service and Pre-Service Middle School
Math Teacher. (Student Center,
Room 236)
Gary Harris, Jerry
Dwyer, Zenaida Aguirre-Munoz, Tara Stevens, Warren Koepp, Juli D’Ann Ratheal
11:00
– 12:30 Luncheon for Department Chairs and MAA Liaisons (Golden Hotel)
12: 00
– 5:00 Registration, Publisher Exhibits, and MAA Book Sales (Student Center, Room 234)
12:45
– 1:00 Opening Remarks and Welcome (Student Center,
Ballroom A)
1:00
– 1:45 Burton W. Jones Distinguished Teaching Award
Invited Lecture
The Traveling Salesperson Problem: A Cross-Disciplinary Example within the Mathematical Sciences
Dr. Steven Janke, Colorado
College, (Student Center,
Ballroom A)
1:45 – 2:00 Exxon
Mobile sponsored break
2:00
– 5:00 Parallel Sessions – Contributed Papers, Special Sessions &
Panels
(Student Center, Ballrooms A, B, C, D, E)
5:05
– 5:55 Friday Keynote Address – Exxon Mobile sponsored (Student Center,
Ballroom A)
The Beauty of Linear Algebra
Dr. Gil Strang, MIT
6:00
– 6:45 Exxon Mobile sponsored Reception and Undergraduate Poster Contest
(Golden Hotel)
Poster Contest Organizer:
Dr. Carl Lienert, Fort
Lewis College
7:00
– 9:00 Banquet and Awards Ceremony (Golden Hotel)
Banquet Address:
A Locally Compact REU: Involving Students in Research in the History of Mathematics
Dr. Elizabeth Mayfield, Hood College
Saturday, April 18
8:00
– 8:50 MAA Rocky Mountain Section Business Meeting (Student Center,
Ballroom A)
Please forward agenda items to Hortensia Soto-Johnson
at hortensia.soto@unco.edu by March 31.
9:00 – 9:45 Saturday Keynote Address (Student Center, Ballroom A)
Women and Mathematics in the Time of Euler
Dr. Elizabeth Mayfield, Hood College
9:45
– 10:00 Exxon Mobile sponsored break
10:00
– 1:00 MAA Book Sales and Publisher Exhibits (Student Center,
Room 234)
10:00
– 12:55 Parallel Sessions – Contributed Papers, Special Sessions &
Panels
(Student
Center, Ballrooms A, B,
C, D, E)
1:00
– 3:00 Open Forum – Academic Freedom (Student Center,
Ballroom E)
Watch for regular meeting updates at http://mcs.mines.edu/About_Us/MAAMeeting.html
Or contact the Program Chair, Barbara Moskal at bmoskal@mines.edu
Colorado Mathematical Olympiad
Colorado Mathematical Olympiad celebrates
A QUARTER CENTURY
Colorado Mathematical Olympiad has reached an historic
landmark: A Quarter Century! The XXV Annual Colorado Mathematical Olympiad
(CMO-2008) took place on April 18, 2008. It brought together some 400 middle and high school students
from all over Colorado: Aspen, Aurora, Bailey, Boulder, Branson, Calhan, Canon
City, Colorado Springs, Dacono, Denver, Ellicott, Englewood, Falcon, Fort
Collins, Fort Lupton, Littleton, Longmont, Loveland, Monument, Parker, Pueblo,
Rangely, Security, U.S. Air Force Academy, Woodland Park. We hosted
participants from Hudson, Ohio,
and Los Altos, California. We also had guest participants
from the Alabama School of Mathematics and Science, Mobile, Alabama,
who earned their trip to our Olympiad by winning their local mathematics
competition.
The Olympians were offered five
problems and four hours to solve them and present complete essay-type
solutions.
The judges
have awarded First prize to Marshall Carpenter, a senior
from Fairview High School of Boulder. He will receive a gold medal of the Olympiad, a
$1,000 scholarship to be used at any certified American university or four-year
college, a $1,000 UCCS Chancellor's Scholarship for CMO Medalists, CASIO
or Texas Instruments Graphing Calculator, CASIO Watch, Wolfram Research’s Mathematica 5.2 (hard copy) and the new,
not yet released Mathematica for
Students 6.0 (download) software, Wolfram Research’s Crystal Star Necklace, and
A. Soifer’s books Colorado Mathematical Olympiad: The First Ten Years and
Further Explorations and Geometric Etudes in Combinatorial Mathematics
(the latter is a joint book with V. G. Boltyanski).
Second prize will be awarded to Daniel Pascua, a senior from Liberty High School. He will receive a silver
medal of the Olympiad, a $1000 scholarship to be used at any certified American
university or four-year college, a $1,000 UCCS Chancellor's Scholarship
for CMO Medalists, CASIO or Texas Instruments Graphing Calculator, CASIO Watch,
Wolfram Research’s Mathematica 5.2
(hard copy) and the new, not yet released Mathematica
for Students 6.0 (download) software, Wolfram Research’s Crystal Star Necklace,
and the books Colorado Mathematical Olympiad: The First Ten Years and
Further Explorations and Geometric Etudes in Combinatorial Mathematics.
Third prize will be
presented to Ben Alpert, a Freshman from Fairview High School
and Ryan Beethe,
a Sophomore from Poudre
High School. They will each receive a bronze medal of the Olympiad, a $250 scholarship to be used at any
certified American university or four-year college, a $1,000 UCCS
Chancellor's Scholarship for CMO Medalists, CASIO or Texas Instruments Graphing
Calculator, CASIO Watch, Wolfram Research’s Mathematica
5.2 (hard copy) and the new, not yet released Mathematica for Students 6.0 (download) software, Wolfram
Research’s Crystal Star Necklace, and the books Colorado Mathematical
Olympiad: The First Ten Years and Further Explorations and Geometric
Etudes in Combinatorial Mathematics.
Fourth prize will be presented to: Samuel Meyer, a Senior from Cheyenne Mt. High School; Alexander Black, an eighth grader from Summit Middle Charter School; Amber Verser, a Junior from Thompson Valley High School; Minh Ly, a Senior from Doherty High School; and Chris Pak, a Senior from Air Academy High School. They will each receive a Casio Watch, Casio or Texas Instruments Graphing Calculator, Wolfram Crystal Star Keyholder, A. Soifer’s Colorado Mathematical Olympiad book, and Wolfram Research’s Mathematica for Students 6.0 (download) software.
First Honorable Mentions will be
awarded to the following 17 contestants:
Mutian Yao, 11, Fairview High School; Charles Xu, 9, Fairview
High School; Norris Xu, 12, Fairview
High School; Michael
Morton, 11, Rangely High School;
Allan Gardner, 9, St.
Mary's High School; Margaret Koehler, 10, Lewis-Palmer
High School; Kathleen Monahan, 11, St.
Mary's High School; Shuli Song, 10, The
Classical Academy; Vicky Li, 12, Fairview
High School; Victor Li, 11, Fairview
High School; Eric James, 10, Mitchell
High School; Eric Eisenberg, 9, Fairview
High School; Sean Lehouillier, 12, Cheyenne
Mountain High School; Peter Jaron, 10, Coronado
High School; Andrew Brunner, 11, Pine
Creek High School; and Chris Guthrie, 9, Fairview
High School.
Our guest, Tian Tan, 11, Murphy High School, Mobile,
Alabama will also be awarded
First Honorable Mention.
They will each receive a Casio Watch, Wolfram Crystal Star Keyholder, A. Soifer’s Colorado Mathematical Olympiad book, and Wolfram Research’s software six-month Mathematica for Students 6.0 (website logon).
Second Honorable Mentions will be
awarded to the following 87 contestants:
John Thilenius, 10 Cheyenne Mt. High School
Christian Pitera, 10 Mesa Ridge High School
Geoffrey Iyer,
12 Fort Collins High School
Nicki Bacovan, 12 Ponderosa High
School
Lucy Lu, 12 Pine Creek High School
Ryan Carson, 8 Altona Middle School
Arielle Steers, 11
Sand Creek High School
Emma Brague, 8 Altona Middle School
Scott Gneiting, 11 Ponderosa
High School
Chris Coviello, 11 Ponderosa High
School
Daniel Nash, 11 Fort Collins High School
Hunter Sceats, 11
Cheyenne Mt. High School
Laura Hopkins, 12
St. Mary's High School
Joseph Mortensen, 11 Fort Collins High School
Zachary Peterson,
10 St. Mary's High
School
William Palma, 8 Corpus Christi Catholic
School
Adam Armstrong, 10 St. Mary's High School
Shawn Smith, 12 St. Mary's High
School
Eli Lovelace, 10 Ponderosa High
School
Jeremy Johnson, 12 Mesa Ridge High School
Ty Traver, 10 Ponderosa
High School
Scott Ritz, 12 Pine Creek
High School
Jade Slayter, 10
Falcon High School
Brandon Barkey, 11
Falcon High School
Taylor Herbert, 10
Falcon High School
Ellie Daw, 8 Altona Middle School
John Slavens, 11
Coronado High School
Dillon Manzanares, 8 Altona Middle School
Sydney Doxtator, 7 Fitzsimmons Middle
School
Trevor Arrasmith, 8 Altona Middle School
Michael Collard, 12
Sand Creek High School
Kira Combs, 10
Sand Creek High School
Brian Nakayama,
12 Doherty High
School
Christopher Del Valle, 9 Mitchell High School
Joshua Olson, 9 Sand Creek High School
Joshua Reding,
12 Doherty
High School
Ayla Williams, 11
Sand Creek High School
Ryan Sandel, 10
Sand Creek High School
Catherine Pond, 8 Altona Middle School
Claud Martin, 11 Branson School
Online
Matt Quereau, 11
Sand Creek High School
Maggie Lusk, 11
Sand Creek High School
Kristen Gilmore, 9 Platte Canyon
Schools
Ashlee Gee,
10 Mitchell
High School
Adam Figueroa, 12 Fort Lupton High
School
David Jimenez,
7 Quest
Academy
Bryson Keith, 10 Ponderosa High
School
Hayley Martin, 10 Ponderosa High
School
Alex Petterson,
11 Fort Collins High School
Matthew Thilenius, 11
Cheyenne Mt. High School
Donald Dodge, 11 Ponderosa High
School
Alec Loudenback, 11 Ponderosa High School
Cameron King, 9 Ponderosa High
School
Darren Kirk, 10 Ponderosa
High School
Kit Pfeiffer, 10 Ponderosa
High School
Veronica Meadows, 10 Ponderosa High School
Peter Ducey, 10 Ponderosa High
School
Vicki Shin, 12 Ponderosa
High School
Isabel Kirk, 10
Ellicot High School
Hanna Scovill, 12 Ponderosa High
School
Troy Wagoner, 10
Falcon High School
Andrew Hadfield, 11 St. Mary's High
School
Melissa Kean, 12 Pine Creek High
School
Luke Pedersen, 8 Irving Middle School
Natalie Gonzalez, 9 Platte
Canyon Schools
Morgan McCadden, 9 Falcon High School
Johnny Hill, 9 Falcon High School
KJ Norlander, 9 Falcon High School
Kelly Haase, 11 Platte
Canyon Schools
Roget Mo, 7 Altona Middle School
Albert Soh, 6 Summit Middle Charter
School
Alejandro Garcia, 8 Altona Middle School
Iana Stoytcheva, 8 Altona Middle School
Annina McMillan, 10
Falcon High School
Garrett Seeman, 10 Coronado High School
Ben Pusey, 10 Platte Canyon
Schools
Allison Pinterpe, 11
Falcon High School
Matt McNichols, 8 Altona Middle School
Jill DeBiase, 8 Fitzsimmons Middle
School
Lauren Wilfong, 6 Irving Middle School
Benji Pacot, 11
Ellicot High School
Jordan Mathis,
10 Mitchell
High School
Jin Beak, 6 Summit Middle Charter School
Daniel Yedidovich, 6 Aurora Hills Middle School
Brenden Lynch, 9 Sand Creek High School
Jena Dillon, 12
Sand Creek High School
Josh Lamson, 11
Sand Creek High School
The Second Honorable Mention winners will receive Wolfram Research’s Crystal Star Keyholder, and Wolfram Research’s six-month Mathematica for Students 6.0 (website logon).
Literary Awards will be presented to
Isabelle Soifer, 11, Los Altos High School, Los Altos,
California and Chelsea Gardner, 11, Ponderosa High School.
Those who wish to
understand the spirit of the Olympiad are invited to solve at least one of the
Olympiad’s five problems. Here, for example, is a problem Old Glory Returns:
A 2008
2008 flag was shot in battle 2008 times. Prove that we can
cut out of it two 250250 squares that have an equal number of bullet holes.
ThIS YEar’s prize fund of the Olympiad has been generously donated by Intermap Technologies, Inc., CASIO, Inc., Wolfram Research, Texas Instruments, City of Colorado Springs, UCCS Bookstore, Air Academy Dist. 20, School Dist. 11, Harrison School Dist. 2, Rangely High School, Fort Collins High School, Falcon Dist. 49, Chancellor, UCCS, Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs, UCCS, Vice Chancellor for Student Success, UCCS, Vice Chancellor for Administration & Finance, UCCS, College of Letters, Arts, and Sciences, UCCS, Office of Campus Activities, UCCS.; and Alexander Soifer.
The Award Presentation program will feature a lecture Creators of Mathematical Coloring, and Review of Solutions of the 25th
Colorado Mathematical Olympiad Problems by Alexander Soifer.
The following guests of honor, hosts and
sponsors will address the winners and present the awards: Pamela Shockley,
Chancellor, and Thomas Christensen, Dean of the College of Letters, Arts, and
Sciences – both from UCCS; Greg Hoffman, Director of Human
Recourses, Intermap Technologies Inc., Maggie Lopez, Assistant Superintendent, Colorado
Springs School District 20; Mary
Thurman, Deputy Superintendent, School District 11; and Alexander
Soifer, Chair, Colorado Mathematical Olympiad.
In the 25
years of Colorado
Mathematical Olympiad, some 16,500
students have participated during 1984-2008. They have written some 84,000
essays, and were awarded some $250,000 in prizes. The Olympiad is a unique
joint effort of school districts, schools, institutions of higher education,
business community and local and State governments.
Mark your caleNdars: The Twenty-Fifth Annual Colorado Mathematical Olympiad will take
place on April 17, 2009 with Award Presentation following on April 24, 2009.
For details please consult http://www.uccs.edu/~asoifer/olympiad.html
.
Alexander Soifer
|
|
Colorado
Mathematical Olympiad
University of Colorado
at Colorado
Springs___________________________________________
Dr
Alexander Soifer, Chair
1420 Austin
Bluffs Parkway Phone: (719) 262-3496 or (719)255-3496 After
Jan. 1, 2009
P.O. Box 7150 e-mail: asoifer@uccs.edu
Colorado Springs, CO 80918 Internet: http://www.uccs.edu/~olympiad/index.htm
|
February 25, 2009
The Colorado Mathematical Olympiad
(CMO) is the nation’s largest annual essay-type competition in the field of
Mathematics. Over the past twenty-six years, thousands of middle and high
school students from throughout Colorado
have taken part in this exciting event. This year’s competition will take place
on Friday, April 17, 2009 and will be held at University of Colorado
at Colorado Springs (UCCS). The Awards Ceremony will take place on Friday,
April 24, 2009. The ceremony will include a lecture to review the problems and solutions,
presentation of awards and certificates, and a reception.
As Chair of CMO, I have stayed
involved in this event since its inception in 1983-1984. In the past 25 years, we have discovered
remarkably talented middle and high school students, who went on to become math
and computer science professors, founders of software companies, and Ph.D.’s in
mathematics, computer science and philosophy.
The Olympiad is a unique, joint
effort of local institutions of higher education; public and private schools of
Colorado;
nation-wide businesses; and city and state governments. Thanks to your
contributions, we award scholarships for any accredited U.S. universities or colleges,
computers, calculators, books, memorabilia. In addition, in 2001 under the
initiative of Chancellor Pam Shockley-Zalabak, Chancellor’s Scholarships were
created for CMO winners. All first,
second, and third place winners are now offered scholarships upon application
and acceptance to UCCS as new freshmen. This is a major contribution to the
education of the gifted mathematicians of Colorado.
I sincerely hope you will join the
list of CMO supporters. Your sponsorship would help show our students that we
are committed to recognizing outstanding educational achievement and invest in
the future of Colorado
by improving educational s opportunities. These youths will undoubtedly become
tomorrow’s leaders of our Country.
I look forward to working with you.
If you would like to make a donation,
please make checks payable to CU-Foundation,
on behalf of CMO; to make a Gift-In-Kind
donation, please contact Margie Teals-Davis, CMO Support Staff for
information on how to do so, no later than January
15, 2009. Do not hesitate to contact her at (719) 262-4552 or via email mtealsda@uccs.edu.
Sincerely,
Alexander
Soifer
Chair, Colorado Mathematical
Olympiad
Professor
of Mathematics, UCCS
The
Section offers the following suggestions which might be of assistance, especially
to first-timers, during preparation of a talk for a Section Meeting.
- The default talk length is 20
minutes, but longer times can be requested. Program organizers will
attempt to provide the amount of time requested for your presentation,
within the limitations of the program. Once you have been notified of the
amount of time allotted, carefully prepare your presentation accordingly.
If possible, plan to leave a few minutes at the end of your presentation
for questions.
- A presider will be assigned to
facilitate each session of presentations. The presider will introduce the
speaker, assist in distribution of any handouts, signal the end of the
presentation, and ask for questions from the audience.
- If handouts are to be provided,
give them to the presider prior to the beginning of the session including
your talk. Plan to bring about 30 handouts and be prepared to give
attendees your address in case the supply runs out. It may also be
possible to arrange for posting of electronic
materials from your talk on the section website; check with program
organizers concerning this possibility.
- Do not plan to present so much
detailed material that your presentation becomes rushed. Focus on
providing the audience with insight into your topic and its key notion
during the presentation. Remember that very few members of the audience
will be experts in the field you are discussing and that the audience will
include some students.
- The use of transparencies on an
overhead projector greatly enhances the pace of a presentation. But make
sure that notes on transparencies are written or typed in a font big
enough and with spacing adequate to be seen clearly 50 to 100 feet away.
Simply copying ordinary typewritten pages will not produce readable
transparencies. Power Point or PDF presentations can serve a similar
purpose in providing pacing for a talk, but be sure to check with program
organizers concerning available technology and means of transferring data.
