Day 13, Mat194: Mathematical Sciences Seminar

Last time

Next time

Announcements:
- I saw several of you at Friday's "Highlights from the KYMAA" talks:
  What did you think?
- Here are the last two upcoming events on my radar:
  - Friday, April 26th: Parker Kain will be giving a talk about his research into AI/Deep Learning, April 26th, around 12:30. More details as they arrive from Parker.
  - Friday, April 26th, 3:05, MEP461: Phil Schmidt, founding director of CINSAM, emeritus faculty member in our department, will give a talk on a problem discussed by Marilyn Vos Savant.
- Some comments from your papers:
  - "No speaker truly changed my mind about what I wanted to do for my career.... speakers allowed me to narrow down my options and helped me determine what I did not want to do as my career."
    (Edison and a hundred ways not to make a lightbulb.)
  - One student summarized well some of the most important takeaways:
    1. communication is a key factor in sustaining a good career;
    2. not giving up is the best mindset to have when trying to find a career;
    3. where you start is not where you end up;
    4. be on the lookout for bigger and better opportunities.
  - Another student mentioned similar themes for each of us to think about:
    1. individuals must be able to clearly communicate results either through papers, presentations, or even direct conversation.
    2. one would greatly benefit from being able to form social and professional networks and networking skills.
  - Another student said this, about a remarkable mathematical moment in school:
    "It was the first time I ... was allowed to be truly curious."
    That's an amazing commentary on a mentor.
  - My comment on the selection of speakers:
    one student mentioned desiring more diversity; another asked for more variety.
    There are many kinds of diversity, of course. One thing I've consciously tried to do is include women, who have historically been under-represented in STEM and mathematics.
    You'll notice that we had 5 women and 5 men speak.
    It would have been wonderful if I could have had Prof. Lisa Holden come in to discuss her astrophysical research, but she declined. She's a very modest person, and wasn't sure what she would have to share. If you want to talk math and physics, she is very approachable and happy to chat with students. Some of her work is featured in posters upstairs, and she has done much undergraduate research with students.
    I also tried to get a GE engineer to come in, but that didn't pan out.
    I've historically had trouble getting teachers, because of their schedules (so Kari is kind of a rare bird, allowing me to find someone in the K-12 world to address education for our math ed majors).
    As you can imagine, it's hard to match the speakers to the desires and interests of everyone.
    I'm sorry if any of you feel that your area of mathematics has been "left out". Please be assured that I take your thoughts seriously, and I will strive to keep these issues in mind next time I run this course.
Today: the wrap-up continues
- For today: you were to produce a "rough sketch" of your poster. This should be a drawing, with boxes describing the sections that you'll be covering. In addition, you should have a one page description about the mathematics that you will be presenting.
  "Poster" is somewhat relative. I'll show you an unusual "poster" that one student once did for me. Feel free to be creative!
- Think of this as an opportunity to present yourself and communicate your interests, two of the highlighted activities from the speakers. As I said last time, also think of this as an opportunity to meet your future research partner!
- We're going to speed date again. You'll have ten minutes with with your partner -- four minutes each to tell your story, then two minutes to react. Only this time your job is to give feedback to each other as you prepare to create your posters.
  Once again evens will stay fixed, and odds will move, according to
  
  self+1+2n
  where n runs from 0 to 3. "Wrap" as needed (e.g. mod 10 arithmetic).

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