Please contact Michael Lloyd if you are interested in advertising in our newsletter.
The following appear in the order in which they were submitted.
Sarah Marsh
In August 2020, Mrs. Janette Wilson retired after four years of service as Assistant Professor of Mathematics. We will miss Jan among our mathematics faculty but wish her a wonderful next season of life!
Nicholas Zoller
The Southern Nazarene University (SNU) Math Department survived the COVID-19 pandemic in the same way that many universities did. After spring break, in March 2020, we delivered all classes online. For Fall 2020, classes were delivered in a hyflex format. We streamed all class meetings live via Zoom and also recorded them for viewing later on each course’s virtual classroom site. We intend to follow the same hyflex format for Spring 2021. Everyone is hopeful that widespread vaccination may make it possible to resume in-person classes without restrictions at the beginning of the Fall 2021 semester in August.
Math Club went on hiatus during the past year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We hope to resume regular meetings and activities in Fall 2021.
Dr. Nicholas Zoller supervised one research project over the past year. During the Spring 2020 semester, Amanda Kinnamon studied the Collatz Conjecture and made significant progress toward a proof of the conjecture. Her work is now submitted for publication.
SNU math major Joshua Crouch was honored by the Section for earning the top score on the 2019 Putnam Exam out of all Oklahoma and Arkansas test-takers. Joshua graduated in May 2020 and is now a Ph.D. student in mathematics at Texas A&M University.
SNU math education major Alexis Cormier participated in three different summer programs. First, she completed a statistics research project to complete a requirement for the SNU McNair Scholars Program. Her project studied the student demographic characteristics that predict success in College Algebra at SNU. Second, Alexis completed the first-ever virtual Budapest Semesters in Math Education. This virtual study abroad program made it possible for Alexis and other USA students to learn about Hungarian math pedagogy and experience it for themselves. Finally, Alexis also completed the STELLAR pre-service teacher workshop sponsored by the Oklahoma Space Grant Consortium. During the workshop, Alexis learned how to use NASA content in her future teaching career.
The SNU Math Department welcomed a familiar face to campus in Fall 2020. Mo Niazi taught three courses as an adjunct professor. Mo graduated from SNU in 2014 with a bachelor’s degree in biology/chemistry. He continued his studies at the University of Oklahoma. While at OU, he earned bachelor’s degrees in mathematics and physics and started working on a Ph.D. in mathematics. Prof. Niazi’s research interests lie in mathematical physics. His addition to the department means that two of our three adjunct faculty are SNU alumni.
Chris Francisco
We are delighted that several OSU math faculty members were honored in 2020. Lisa Mantini received the MAA Certificate of Meritorious Service to recognize her many contributions to the MAA at the section and national levels. Henry Segerman was selected as one of the winners of the OSU Distinguished Early Career Faculty Awards. Gerri Petty, a long-time lecturer in our department, earned the OSU Excellence in Teaching Award for Adjunct Faculty.
OSU math alumni and students also earned some great honors in 2020. Professor Gretchen Matthews, an OSU math alumna who is now a Professor of Mathematics at Virginia Tech University, was recently named a Fellow of the Association for Women in Mathematics, recognizing her outstanding research in coding theory and mentoring work. Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers appointed Mario White, an OSU alumnus in math and history, as a Dane County Circuit Court Judge over the summer. Math major Jaden Kasitz was elected OSU Student Body President. Graduate student Ali Pirhadi won the Robberson Summer Dissertation Fellowship, a prestigious university-wide fellowship that will help him finish his Ph.D. work.
In July, Paul Fili was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure. John Doyle, who works in arithmetic dynamics, joined our faculty in the fall, bringing an NSF research grant. Xukai Yan, who works in PDEs, also joined our faculty; he recently completed a postdoc at Georgia Tech.
Finally, we are especially excited that Neil Hoffman and Bella Tobin were awarded a grant from the OSU President’s Fellows Campus Funding program for a Distinguished Women in Mathematics Colloquium Series. Unfortunately, the series had to be delayed due to the pandemic, but we are looking forward to getting it started as soon as it is safe to do so.
Thomas McNamara
The SWOSU Mathematics Department would like to welcome their newest faculty member, Dr. Sunil Giri. Dr. Giri graduated from Tribhuvan University in Nepal before studying in the United States. He then earned a doctoral degree in mathematics at Florida Atlantic University and currently researches mathematical modeling of infectious diseases.
John Diamantopoulos
NSU was honored to play host to the 2019 Annual Section meeting of the OK-AR MAA, but saddened that Covid-19 took the 2020 meeting from us all. We are very much looking forward to the 2021 virtual Section meeting hosted by Cameron University and hopefully returning to a FTF meeting at Henderson State University in 2022. Joshua Graff has five years of experience teaching K-12 mathematics in rural Oklahoma. He has also been teaching at NSU part time since 2017 and became full time instructor in 2020 and typically teaches developmental and entry level mathematics courses. Dr. Luke Foster received tenure and promotion to associate professor in August 2020. Dr. Ernst Bekkering was promoted to professor in August 2020. Recently stepping down from the role, the department of Mathematics and Computer Science wishes to express its sincere gratitude to Dr. Darryl Linde for his 24+ years of service as department chair! Dr. Linde continues to teach and is an active member of the department.
Carolyn Eoff
The past year was a year of challenges for HSU but also of growth, as we (like most everyone else) dealt with the sudden switch to remote teaching last March due to the pandemic. HSU was still reeling from financial mismanagement by its former administration. As a result, HSU has recently become a member of the Arkansas State University system, a positive outcome of a trying situation. The switch to remote education forced our faculty to become adept at using technologies to teach and test students remotely; this allows us to reach out to potential majors for whom a traditional on-campus experience is not feasible, another positive outcome of the pandemic.
Our student clubs and chapter of KME have been mostly inactive since the onset of the pandemic. Probably the highlight of 2020 was our team (Bryan Neal, Eric Carter, Greg Jordan, and Dallas Crumby) winning first place in the 17th annual Arkansas Undergraduate Mathematics Competition, which we hosted in February. Despite the pandemic, our graduates in 2020 were successful in securing lucrative positions in industry and education; in particular, our teacher interns had job offers before they graduated, with one hired during her internship.
We lost one faculty member, Tiffani Grayer, who went to work at the Arkansas Department of Education. One of our computer science faculty members, Catherine Leach, was appointed to serve on the Arkansas 2020 Computer Science Standards Committee, which revised our state’s K-12 computer science standards and courses. Fred Worth was awarded the HSU Faculty Excellence Award in service in 2020.
Chris Camfield
At Hendrix College, we have enjoyed a few promotions since our last update. Gabe Ferrer and Mark Goadrich are now full professors. Chris Camfield has been promoted to Associate Professor and now serves as the department chair. We welcomed a new visiting professor, Keely Grossnickle, in 2019. Keely earned her doctorate from Kansas State University and specializes in topology. Duff Campbell is also now retired.
We launched a Data Analytics minor in 2019, and it grows in popularity every year. We have also spent the last few years modifying our Calculus sequence to utilize free and open-source resources while making the lecture periods more hands-on. The timing proved incredibly convenient when students needed to access everything remotely!
Nikola Petrov
Dr. Travis Mandel joined the department as a tenure-track Assistant Professor. He is an expert in Algebraic Geometry, working on cluster algebras and algebro-geometric aspects of mirror symmetry. Travis holds a Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin and has held positions at Aarhus (Denmark), the University of Utah, and the University of Edinburgh.
Dr. Peter Patzt is a new tenure-track Assistant Professor. He works on group cohomology and representation stability. Peter holds a Ph.D. from the Free University of Berlin and has held a postdoctoral appointment at Purdue University. For the academic year 2020/2021, he is visiting Copenhagen University.
Dr. Emily Gunawan is a new postdoc working in Algebraic Geometry. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota and has held positions at Gustavus Adolphus College and the University of Connecticut. Emily will be mentored by Greg Muller.
Dr. Hitesh Gakhar is a new postdoc who has arrived from Michigan State University, where he received a Ph.D. degree in 2020. He works in Topological Data Analysis; Miro Kramár will be his mentor.
Dr. Mario Morán Cañón accepted a postdoctoral position in our department. He received a Ph.D. degree in 2020 at Université de Rennes 1. He works in Algebraic Geometry and will be mentored by Roi Docampo. For the academic year 2020/2021, he is visiting Université de Rennes 1.
Allen Wu received an NSF grant DMS-2006212, entitled “Stratified Fluids and Completely Integrable Partial Differential Equations.”
Ricardo Mendez received an NSF grant DMS-2005373, entitled “Foliations, Invariant Theory, and Submanifolds.”
Justin Malestein received a Collaboration Grant from the Simons Foundation, entitled “Linear Representations of the Mapping Class Group and Related Groups.”
Meijun Zhu received a Simons Foundation grant entitled “Sobolev type inequality with weight.”
Deborah Moore-Russo is a co-PI of the NSF grant entitled “Testing a Model of Instructor Feedback to Improve College Students’ Success in Calculus.”
The Undergraduate Math Advisor Catherine Hall was named the College of Arts and Science Dean’s Outstanding Academic Advisor.
Ying Wang received the Vice President for Research and Partnerships Award for Outstanding Research Engagement.
Nikola Petrov received the Regents’ Award for Superior Teaching.
Javier Alejandro Chavez-Dominguez was honored and highlighted by the Lathisms, an organization founded in 2016 that showcases the contributions of Latinx and Hispanic mathematicians during Hispanic Heritage Month.
Javier Alejandro Chavez-Dominguez, Keri Kornelson, and Miro Kramár have been selected to offer an OU Presidential Dream Course titled The Mathematics of Data in Spring 2021 (later deferred until Spring 2022). This is the third Presidential Dream Course that has been awarded to the Math Department.
Michael Jablonski and Ricardo Mendes were the local organizers of a new regional conference titled Symmetry and Geometry on the Southern Great Planes, held at the University of Oklahoma on January 24–26, 2020.
The paper “Highly connected 7-manifolds and non-negative curvature” by Krishnan Shankar, Sebastian Goette, and Martin Kerin has been published in the Annals of Mathematics.
Keri Kornelson has been elected as Chair-Elect of the OU Faculty Senate.
The graduate student Joey Randich was awarded the Science Mathematics and Research for Transformation (SMART) scholarship through the Department of Defense.
Candace Andrews, Carye Chapman, Casey Haskins, and Cory Wilson received a Collaborative Research and Development sub-award from OSU’s NSF Mathematical Inquiry Project Award for their submission, “Multiple Problem-Solving Strategies and Representational Equivalence in College Algebra and Pre-Calculus.” This award will involve funding for stipends to curate and generate materials related to active learning, meaningful applications, and general student success skills to be disseminated across the state of Oklahoma.
Jeanine Myers