MAA Rocky Mountain Section — Spring 2018 Candidates for Office

Shawna has a BA in Mathematics (1988, CU Boulder) and a MS in Applied Mathematics (1995, CU Denver). Shawna was hired in 2002 as full-time faculty at Pikes Peak Community College. Prior to that she was three years at Community College of Aurora, and eight years at Community College of Denver as an adjunct. Currently, she is co-chair of the College-Level Mathematics Department. She is very passionate about teaching and learning mathematics. She became a professional tutor at a community college in 1990 and discovered the joy of teaching mathematics. Since then, she has been teaching as an adjunct or full-time faculty member. Over the span of her teaching career, she has taught all the algebras, mathematics for the liberal arts, trigonometry, Precalculus, all the calculus, discrete mathematics, linear algebra, and differential equations in a variety of formats. She has taught Intermediate Algebra and College Algebra frequently, specializing in the online format.

Shawna enjoys spending time with family and friends, reading novels, gardening, and photographing nature.

Dr. Michelle "Shelly" Ray is a Professor of Mathematics and the former Director of Academic Assessment at Aims Community College. In her role as Director, she developed and established the foundation for the assessment practices currently in place at her institution. She is currently back in the classroom where her primary teaching areas include: the Calculus sequence, Trigonometry, Statistics, Math for the Liberal Arts, College Algebra, Career Math, and Introduction to Education. Shelly has been teaching at the collegiate level since 1999. Dr. Ray Parsons as a consultant in higher education supporting best practices in assessment of student learning with colleges and universities, as well as the Colorado Department of Higher Education (CDHE). She was a lead consultant on the Re-envisioning GTPathways project for the State of Colorado working collaboratively with faculty from across the state to revise the competencies and learning outcomes for general education transfer courses. In working with colleges and universities to meet the demands of accreditation related to assessment of student learning, she advises on the development and implementation of multi-level institutional assessment plans and practices. Dr. Ray currently serves on the Math Pathways Task Force for the State of Colorado as the two-year lead and presents the work of the task force at regional, state, and national events. She is the leading the efforts for the curriculum redesign in the Quantitative Reasoning/Quantitative Literacy path including faculty professional development in best practices to engage these types of learners to support the redesign.

I received my PhD in theoretical mathematics from UCLA in 2005. After a three-year post-doctoral position at Northwestern University, in 2008 I joined the math department at MSU Denver (at the time still called the Metropolitan State College of Denver). I joined the MAA shortly after moving to Denver and have been an active member at our regional meetings since, either by presenting my work or by organizing special sessions related to IBL teaching methods. My research area is Algebraic K-Theory, but in the recent years I have been more involved with the IBL movement, as I am convinced that this teaching style greatly benefits my students.

While I don't have experience yet as secretary/treasurer for the MAA, I promise to be a dedicated servant to our Rocky Mountains section, and to the MAA community. If elected, I will continue the tradition of timely addressing all the section's needs, and keeping a transparent record on how it operates.

Tracii Friedman earned her B.S. in Mathematics from St. Joseph's University in 1992 and her M.S. in 1994 and Ph.D. in 1997, both in Mathematics from Lehigh University. She has been on the faculty at Colorado Mesa University since 2002 where she teaches a wide range of courses and enjoys trying out new pedagogical ideas (often inspired by something learned at an MAA conference!). She incorporates active learning strategies into all of her courses and has transformed several upper level courses by shifting to a flipped classroom approach. In addition to mentoring students in her courses, she served as Math Club advisor for six years and has supervised over 20 undergraduate research projects, including three that received Outstanding Presentation Awards, three that were grant supported, and one that resulted in a publication. She has served on many CMU committees, often in positions of leadership. Some of these committees include the Teacher-to-Teacher Professional Development Committee for six years; Faculty Senate for five years (one year as Vice-President); Academic Policies for three years (two as Chair); and three Program Review Committees (one as Chair).

Tracii has been a member of the MAA since 1996 and is a Project NExT Fellow (an original Peach Dot '97). She has been active in the Rocky Mountain Section, serving as Program Chair for the 2016 Joint Rocky Mountain/Intermountain Section Meeting; as a member of the Program Committee for the Joint Section Meeting in 2006; as a member of the RMS Nominating Committee for three years (one year as chair); and as a member of the ECTA Selection Committee for one year. She also regularly participates in and co-chairs sessions at the regional Section Meetings and would be thrilled to have the opportunity to serve the MAA Rocky Mountain Section as Secretary-Treasurer.

Debra (Deb) Carney grew up in Massachusetts and received her B.S. in mathematics from the University of Vermont. She earned her Ph.D. in Mathematical Logic from the University of Maryland, College Park in 1998. She arrived at the Colorado School of Mines (CSM) in 2012 after spending nine years on the faculty at the University of Denver in a teaching focused position. Currently she is a Teaching Associate Professor at the Colorado School of and the Assistant Department Head for the Department of Applied Mathematics and Statistics at CSM. She is interested in innovative teaching techniques that improve student learning, including active learning. Debra has co-developed a partially flipped model of instruction for linear algebra and results have been shared in a peer reviewed journal. Currently her research interests are in the area of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning.

Debra has also developed a passion for mentoring women in mathematics. In 2013, She co-created and currently co-advises the Society for Women in Mathematics (SWiM) at CSM. Approximately 20 students and faculty attend bi-monthly informal dinner meetings to discuss ideas and issues relevant to women in mathematics. Each month one meeting highlights a CSM alumna who shares her mathematical path and insights into her career. Alternate meetings include professional development workshops, including salary negotiation and a summer opportunities panel. SWiM has been successful in obtaining corporate funding and is also a student chapter of the Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM).

Debra has been actively attending and participating in MAA conferences including Rocky Mountain Sectional meetings, the Joint Mathematical meetings, and MathFest. She is also a member of the SIGMAA's on IBL and RUME. Serving as Governor of the Rocky Mountain Section of the MAA would be her first official position with the MAA and she looks forward to the opportunity.

Debra enjoys hiking and traveling especially to Cape Cod every summer, with her husband and two children. She loves to spend time volunteering with her children's activities including math club, Lego league, and scouting. She met her husband Nic on the first day of graduate school and they have been solving problems together ever since!

I am honored to run as the congressional representative for the Rocky Mountain Section of the MAA. I received my PhD from the University of Wisconsin in Madison in 1994, working in applied probability under the direction of Tom Kurtz. I joined the Department of Applied Mathematics at CU Boulder in August 1994 as an instructor. I was later promoted to Senior Instructor in 1998 and became Associate Chair for the department in 2000. In 2017 I was one of the initial cohort of twelve senior instructors at CU Boulder who were designated as Teaching Professors, an honorary title.

My entire career at CU Boulder has been focused on CU students, both through the courses I teach and the programs and committees I serve on. For example, for the past fourteen years I have worked with other schools to host the Front Range Applied Math Student Conference at CU Denver. This conference provides a supportive environment for undergraduate and graduate students to present their research and meet students from nearby schools. Another example is recruiting and training students to participate in the international Mathematical Contest in Modeling (MCM). The MCM is a four-day event in which students, working in teams of three, select one of several, open-ended problems to research, to develop mathematical and numerical models, and then to write a significant research paper. The MCM is an opportunity for students to showcase their mathematical, computational, and communication skills. I am also the faculty representative for the Goldwater scholarship. Over the years I have worked with students on their applications and have seen many go on to graduate work and successful careers.

I joined the MAA several years ago and have always appreciated the friendly interactions and broadly accessible conferences. In 2014 I received the Burton W. Jones Award for Distinguished Teaching. I am interested in increasing my interactions with others in the Rocky Mountain section and believe I can do this by serving as the congressional representative. I would like to learn from other schools and then share those insights with the Rocky Mountain Section faculty. I believe mathematics is foundational to many careers and I look forward to continuing to improve mathematical instruction to the best of my ability.

Gus Greivel earned his BS and MS in Mathematical and Computer Sciences from the Colorado School of Mines, where he has been a member of the faculty since 1996. He is currently a Teaching Professor of Applied Mathematics and Statistics (AMS) and has served as Assistant Department Head in AMS as well as Articulation Coordinator, overseeing the implementation of transfer articulation agreements between Mines and other area 2- and 4- year institutions.

Gus' primary instructional responsibilities have been teaching and coordinating courses in the Mines core mathematics curriculum as well as leading in the development of program-level curriculum and developing and teaching a variety of statistics courses for AMS majors. His most recent instructional emphasis has involved adopting the successful SCALE-UP delivery model from the Physics Education Research community to the Multivariate Calculus and the Probability and Statistics courses in the Mines core curriculum.

In addition to his instruction, Gus has been active in outreach activities, innovations in course delivery, and in designing programs to positively impact the STEM student pipeline. Over the past two decades, he has frequently collaborated with the Mines Multicultural Engineering Program to recruit and retain students from underrepresented populations in STEM. More recently, he has been the PI on a grant from the National Science Foundation to explore pathways to secondary licensure for STEM majors and co-PI on a grant from the Office of Naval Research, to explore benefits of a SCALE-UP delivery in the Honors Multivariate Calculus course at Mines.

Gus has been an active member of the MAA and the SIGMAA on Statistics Education and has enjoyed participating at MAA Conferences, including MathFest, the Joint Meetings, and Rocky Mountain Sectional Meeting. He is a past member of the Nominating Committee for the Rocky Mountain Section and would welcome the opportunity to represent this section as its MAA Congressional Representative.

In his free time, Gus enjoys bicycling and skiing, traveling with his family and training his recently adopted puppy. He also has two children and a spouse that keep him busy and entertained.