2007 Annual Meeting
 
Welcome!Northern Kentucky University is pleased to host the 2007 Annual Meeting of the KYMAA on March 30-31, 2007. This should be an enjoyable and inspiring meeting and we strongly encourage you to join the fun. Perhaps you can give a talk, or just come and listen to what your fellow mathematicians are up to these days.More information will be provided below, including a description of the invited talks, a call for papers, information for students, meeting forms, directions, and lodging and meal information. A complete schedule for the meeting should be available on this site by March 12, 2007 at: Program for the 2007 Annual Meeting of KYMAA Please note the following important dates for the KYMAA Annual Meeting:
The various meeting forms can be obtained via the following links:
The Invited TalksOn Friday evening, the invited talk will be given by Professor Aparna Higgins of the University of Dayton. The title of her talk is Demonic Graphs and Undergraduate Research. Saturday morning will feature two invited speakers:
Abstracts and Bios Aparna Higgins, Demonic Graphs and Undergraduate Research. Abstract: My work with undergraduates on mathematical research has been one of the most satisfying aspects of my teaching career. This talk will highlight some of the beauty and depth of the research done by my former undergraduate students on line graphs and pebbling on graphs. We will consider iterated line graphs, some pioneering results in pebbling graphs, and pebbling numbers of line graphs. The results of some of the later students built on work done by the earlier ones, and have spawned some of my own recent research. Biographical Information: Dr. Aparna Higgins received a B.Sc. in mathematics from the University of Bombay in 1978 and a Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Notre Dame in 1983. Her dissertation was in universal algebra, and her current research interests are in graph theory. She has taught at the University of Dayton, Ohio, since 1984. Although Dr. Higgins enjoys teaching the usual collection of undergraduate courses and an occasional graduate course, her most fulfilling experiences as a teacher have come from directing undergraduates in mathematical research. She has advised eleven undergraduate Honors theses; she has co-directed an NSF-sponsored Research Experiences for Undergraduates program. Dr. Higgins has been the recipient of four teaching awards--from the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Dayton, the Alumni Award (a University-wide award), the Ohio Section of the MAA, and in 2005, the Deborah and Tepper Haimo Award for Distinguished College or University Teaching, which is the MAA’s most prestigious award for teaching. Dr. Higgins has chaired the MAA Committee on Student Chapters and is co-director of Project NExT. Austin French, Teaching: How to Grow Better Instead of Bitter, How to Grow Better Instead of Burned Out Abstract: 45 minutes of one sentences that I have learned, any one of which can drastically make things better for teacher and student. How to have enjoyable, briefer prep time and paper grading time. How to enjoy teaching the lowest level courses. How to overcome in the area of campus politics and the competition of class time with pledging. Substitutionary burden bearing by a wisdom system. Minimality measure for math excellence. Quagmireism vs. clear\conciseism in education. Dependence reinforcing help vs. transformation help for students. An option to having a battle of the wills with non-star performers….and much more. Biographical Information: Austin French received his Ph.D. in mathematics from Auburn University, an M.S. in computer science from UK, and has subsequently held positions at David Lipscomb, Louisiana State, UK, and, since 1976, Georgetown College. He has consulted for Toyota, Proctor and Gamble, and IBM. His excellence in teaching has been recognized at Georgetown on five occasions. Since 2002, he has published seven books and accompanying DVDs and CDs. Additionally, he has papers in three academic disciplines. Bernd Sturmfels, The Joy of Solving Equations Abstract: Grobner bases are a fun method for solving algebraic equations. See how it works, why it is useful, and what you should do with the coins in your pocket. Biographical Information: Bernd Sturmfels received doctoral degrees in Mathematics in 1987 from the University of Washington, Seattle, and the Technical University Darmstadt, Germany. After two postdoctoral years at the Insitute for Mathematics and its Applications, Minneapolis, and the Research Institute for Symbolic Computation, Linz, Austria, he taught at Cornell University, before joining UC Berkeley in 1995, where he is Professor of Mathematics and Computer Science. His honors include a National Young Investigator Fellowship, a Sloan Fellowship, and a David and Lucile Packard Fellowship. Sturmfels served as von Neumann Professor at TU Munich in Summer 2002, as the Hewlett-Packard Research Professor at MSRI Berkeley in 2003/04, and he was a Clay Senior Scholar in 2004. A leading experimentalist among mathematicians, Sturmfels has authored or edited 13 books and about 150 research articles, in the areas of combinatorics, algebraic geometry, symbolic computation and their applications. He currently works on algebraic methods in statistics and computational biology.
A Call for PapersOne of the main activities of our annual meetings is the presentation of papers by faculty and students. Please consider giving a talk at this year's meeting. Use this opportunity to share mathematical ideas and insights, an interesting mathematical application, or an effective teaching innovation with your colleagues from across the state. For students, consider reporting on an honor's project or a summer research project. A panel presentation on current mathematical issues is always interesting. For both faculty and students, if you wish to make a presentation, fill out the Presentation Abstract Form and submit it by February 28, 2007. A copy of the form can be obtained on this webpage. In general, talks are scheduled for 20-minute intervals. Each talk should be about 15 minutes to leave time for a couple of questions and transition to the next talk. Special presentations can be allocated more time if necessary. It is important to note any special needs and a time preference on this form. Please submit the Presentation Abstract Form by e-mail to:
Tom Richmond
Nominations NeededThis spring we will be holding elections for Vice-Chair, Chair Elect, Newsletter Editor, and Treasurer. All new officers will begin their terms at the Executive Committee Meeting immediately following the Annual Business Meeting in the spring. The new Vice-Chair and Newsletter Editor will serve three-year terms. The Chair Elect will serve for four years, two as Chair Elect and then two years as the Chair of the section. The new Treasurer will serve for four years simply to balance out the future election schedule. Subsequently the Treasurer’s term of office will be three years. If you have any questions about these positions, please feel free to contact the current people in these positions or read the “job descriptions” in our bylaws.
Please forward the name and affiliation of any Section member you would like to nominate for one of these offices to any member of the Nominating Committee by February 28. Self-nominations are entirely appropriate.
Update from the Nominating CommitteeThe nominating committee has received the following nominations
for officers. Further nominations are welcome and may be made at the
meeting or by emailing someone from the nominating committee. You
will note that it is no longer possible to be on the nominating
committee and succeed in ducking a nomination! Also, thank you to
Doug Chatham for agreeing to keep the newsletter going for another 3
years. Hey Students!I hope your fall term went well. Seniors who are planning to go to graduate school are busy applying to graduate programs – and working hard to finish their undergraduate studies strong! If you will still be an undergraduate in the Fall Semester of 2007, then you should consider participating in a summer REU (Research Experience for Undergraduates). Check out http://www.maa.org/students/undergrad/research.html for more information. Faculty members can help you determine which REUs you would like best, and they can help you apply. Depending on the REU, the application deadline may be any time from the end of January through late March. Don’t forget the Mathematical Contest in Modeling (MCM) and the Interdisciplinary Contest in Modeling (ICM). These are four day competitions that start at 8pm on Thursday, February 8 and end at 8pm on Monday, February 12. This competition is for three-student teams. Your institution may have more than one team, but a student may be on only one team and each team works on only one problem. More information is available from http://www.comap.com/undergraduate/contests/mcm/. The registration deadline is 2pm on Thursday, February 8. April is Mathematics Awareness Month. This year's theme is Mathematics and the Brain. For information concerning activities and to download a poster, check out http://www.mathaware.org/. Encourage your math/computer science clubs to organize activities during the month of April. You can also kick off the 2007 Mathematics Awareness Month celebration by organizing a trip to attend the Annual KYMAA Section Meeting, March 30-31, 2007 at Northern Kentucky University. The KYMAA Section Meeting is a great opportunity for students to give a talk to a friendly audience. Twenty undergraduate students presented papers at the 2006 meeting. Start thinking about a presentation, discuss it with a professor at your institution and get ready. Here are some ideas: Discuss your team’s work in the MCM or ICM. If there is a mathematics or computer science topic you would like to investigate, do the work, then share what you learned at the section meeting. This activity makes your resume more attractive. Student presenters will have a choice of a free one-year subscription to the Mathematical Association of America, which includes a monthly publication of the student's choice, or a book. When you register for the meeting, register for the Friday evening banquet, too. Meals for students will again be at a discounted price. Students who have attended the banquet in the past have truly enjoyed it. Don’t miss it! I will be writing a newsletter to be included with the registration packet at the section meeting, and I need your help providing highlights of your activities. Please have one of your club members send a brief summary to m.dobranski@moreheadstate.edu. Your responses are highly appreciated. If you have any questions about the information above, please feel free to contact me.
Mike Dobranski at
m.dobranski@moreheadstate.edu Hotel InformationBlocks have been reserved at the following hotels. Please note the different deadlines for the different hotels.
Directions and MapsDirections to NKU can be found here: http://www.nku.edu/directions.php Campus maps can be found here: http://access.nku.edu/campusplan/campusmap_right.htm (Note: NKU has two campuses. The Annual Meeting is on the
(main) Highland Heights campus, not the Covington campus.) Future KYMAA MeetingsOur schedule of hosts for future section meetings is:
Please contact any officer of KYMAA if you would interested in
hosting a future meeting. Meeting Program & AbstractsThe information at the following links will be complete on March 12:The meeting program can be found at: Program for the 2007 Annual Meeting of KYMAA (html) The meeting program can also be found at: Program for the 2007 Annual Meeting of KYMAA (doc) The abstracts for talks can be found at: Abstracts for the 2007 Annual Meeting of KYMAA (doc) KYMAA Section NExTModeled after the National Project NExT, the mission of the Kentucky
Section NExT (New Experiences in Teaching), is to
support soon-to-be, newly-minted, and recent-but-untenured Ph.D.s in the
mathematical sciences (including all areas of mathematics, statistics,
operations research, and mathematics education) in their role as mathematics
faculty. In particular, the goal of KY-NExT is to foster and enhance all
aspects of an academic career: high-quality teaching and learning of
mathematics, productive research and scholarship, and meaningful
professional activities.
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