Recent News
Math Professor Leads Cal Poly Chapter of Statewide Service Program
Apr 5, 2022
Cal Poly has been selected as one of 45 higher education institutions to implement the statewide #CaliforniansForAll College Corps program on its campus, and math Professor Erin Pearse is helping lead the campus effort.
#CaliforniansForAll College Corps is an initiative by Gov. Gavin Newsom that aims to provide 6,500 college students statewide with service-learning opportunities over the span of two academic years to tackle challenges in climate action, K-12 education and food insecurity.
Thanks to partnerships built by Pearse through the Initiative for Climate Leadership and Resilience, students across campus will have the opportunity to work on climate action projects with community organizations. In true Learn by Doing fashion, students will plan and build the infrastructure that will reduce the carbon footprint of Central Coast communities from Santa Barbara to Santa Cruz.
College of Science and Mathematics media intern Devan Spiegel got all the details from Pearse in a recent episode of the Cal Poly Can podcast. Listen in and find out how students will become climate leaders and receive $10,000 toward their college education in return.
Listen In
Mathematics Professor Erin Pearse talks with media intern Devan Spiegel about #CaliforniansForAll and how Cal Poly students can earn $10,000 for their education while becoming climate leaders in the latest episode of the Cal Poly Can podcast.
Polymath 2022
Apr 5, 2022
Featured Articles
Math Professor Leads Cal Poly Chapter of Statewide Service Program
Through the statewide #CaliforniansForAll College Corps, Cal Poly students will earn $10,000 toward their education by becoming climate leaders, and Math Professor Erin Pearse is leading the way.
Letter from the Chair
Ben Richert celebrates the return to campus and other department achievements.
Students Say It's 'Absolutely Amazing to Be Back in Person'
Club presidents share their experience of being back on campus.
Passing on the Favor in Gratitude to Charlie Hanks
Former department chair Charles Hanks played a significant role in Stephen Corcoran's (Mathematics, B.S., ‘69; M.A., ‘75) life. Now Corcoran has taken over funding a scholarship in Hanks' name.
All in a Day's Work - Research and Publications
From numerical bifurcation, to equations describing electrical activity in cardiac tissue, to hands-on math education manipulatives, students and faculty have been busy.
Letter from the Chair 2021
Apr 7, 2021
Alumni and friends of the Mathematics Department,
What a year it’s been! Ever since that fateful day in March 2020, all math classes have been conducted as virtual affairs. The change was rather abrupt and could have been a disaster but for the flexibility and ingenuity of math faculty and staff. We recognized right away that nothing can replace the collaborative face-to-face experience that is the centerpiece of our major. It required an incredible effort and sacrifice to reproduce our usual practices as much as possible online — but we rose to the challenge.
While we eagerly await a return to the chalkboards in Building 38, our pandemic operations have made me nothing but proud. Similar observations can be made about our students. Community building and the benefits of peer-to-peer instruction and collaboration — not to mention the encouragement of shared experiences — are difficult to manufacture over Zoom, but math majors are finding a way. Our students have certainly justified our high opinion of their abilities.
The usual activities in the department continue apace though modified by the pandemic. For example, honors during our Spring 2020 Awards Ceremony, usually a banquet, were conferred by many celebrity guests from within and beyond the department, including a special congratulatory shoutout from math Ph.D. Winnie Cooper. We had 25 students and seven faculty members participate in summer research projects with virtual meetings and presentations and I see many interesting senior projects and master’s theses come across my desk digitally. Faculty members' individual research projects also continue. Again, though constrained by circumstances, the department has performed admirably.
A big issue on (virtual) campus lately has been growing Cal Poly’s leadership as a data science and analytics innovator in research and education. The Math Department is part of this campus-wide effort and recently submitted a $1.3 million dollar grant proposal to the National Science Foundation to support data science course development. We look forward to what will happen next with this important undertaking.
Finally, I'd like to once again thank everyone who has supported the department financially. Your gifts have a direct impact on the quality of our program. For example, Math 351 Typesetting with LaTeX; Math 370 Putnam Exam Seminar; and Math 371 Math Modelling Seminar are important classes for the major but cannot be funded via the state budget in 2021-22. Thanks to donor support, though, we will still be able to run these classes next year. We are incredibly grateful for the flexibility and opportunity provided by your generous donations.
Please keep in touch and let us know what you’ve been up to. Once we're all back and live, we'd love to see you at the department office if you're ever on campus.
Student and Faculty Research and Publications 2021
Mar 25, 2021
Not even a global pandemic can stop the progress of mathematics. Students and faculty were active in their field last year, researching and publishing on topics such as Coarse Ricci curvature, functional connectivity in the brain and Gross-Pitaevskii equations.
Student-Faculty Research
Eric Brussel worked with undergraduates Ian Gallagher, Andy Haase and Bailey Wickham in the 2020 Frost Summer Research Program. They presented a poster on these results titled “Spheres of Planes in Generalized Quaternions” at the Mathematical Association of America Golden Section Meeting in February.
Vincent Bonini worked with students Caroline Semmens, Tyler Tran and Shiaohan Liu during the Frost Summer Research Program. The students studied Coarse Ricci Curvature of Paley graphs and used their algebraic structure to establish an explicit formula for the Coarse Ricci curvature of Paley Graphs. They hope to publish this work in a college journal when time permits.
Goro Kato continued to run two Alexander von Humboldt Institute Seminars: “Non-linear PDEs” with Jerry Lin from George Mason University, Caixing Gu and math student Joel Pion; and “Sheaves and Categories” with Neil Theise from New York University, Menas Kafatos from Chapman University, Jerry Lin from George Mason University, Caixing Gu and math students Joel Pion and Grace Hochrein.
Stathis Charalampidis worked with undergraduates Marisa Lee, Rachel Loh and Harry Yan during the Frost Summer Research Program on a project titled “Energy localization in granular crystals for energy harvesting.” Charalampidis also worked with math major Wesley Khademi on an independent study on physically-informed neural networks.
Elena Dimintrova worked with students Fred Streetman, Jackie Driscoll, Matthew Mazzagatte and Vanessa Newsome-Slade during the Frost Summer Research Program on a project titled “Inferring functional connectivity in the brain.” Dimintrova also worked with graduate students Cameron Fredrickson, Nick Rondoni and Codi Barnett on a National Science Foundation-funded summer research project on the selection methods for algebraic design of experiments.
Faculty Publications
- Bonini V, Carroll C, Dinh U, Dye S, Frederick J, and Pearse E. (2020) Condensed Ricci Curvature of Complete and Strongly Regular Graphs. Involve 13:559-576. https://doi.org/10.2140/involve.2020.13.559
- Boullé N, Charalampidis EG, Farrell PE and Kevrekidis PG. (2020) Deflation-based Identification of Nonlinear Excitations of the 3D Gross-Pitaevskii equation. Phys. Rev. A, 102:053307
- Charalampidis EG, Boullé N, Kevrekidis PG and Farrell PE. (2020) Bifurcation analysis of stationary solutions of two-dimensional coupled Gross-Pitaevskii equations using deflated continuation. Commun. Nonlinear Sci. Numer. Simulat, 87:105255
- Charalampidis EG, Dawson J, Cooper F, Khare A and Saxena A. (2020) Stability and response of trapped solitary wave solutions of coupled nonlinear Schrödinger equations in an external, $\mathcal{PT}$- and supersymmetric potential. J. Phys. A: Math. and Theor., 53:455702
- von der Heydt AS, Ashwin P, Camp CD, Crucifix M, Dijkstra HA, Ditlevsen P , and Lenton TM. (2021) Quantification and interpretation of the climate variability record, Global and Planetary Change 197: 103399, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloplacha.2020.103399
- Kato G and Nishimura K. (2020) Toward a descent theoretic formulation for organization and emergence -An initial object sheaf hypothesis and its consequence. 10.13140/RG.2.2.30759.37282
- Koshy-Chenthittayil S, Dimitrova E. (2020). From Chaos to Permanence Using Control Theory (Research). In: Acu B., Danielli D., Lewicka M., Pati A., Saraswathy RV, Teboh-Ewungkem M. (eds) Advances in Mathematical Sciences. Association for Women in Mathematics Series, vol 21. Springer, Cham.
- Murrugrarra D and Dimitrova E. (2021) Quantifying the total effect of edge interventions in discrete multistate networks. Automatica, 125:109453
- Paquin D, Kato D, and Kim P. (2020) A mathematical model for the effects of grandmothering on human longevity. Mathematical Biosciences and Engineering 17:3175-3189. doi: 10.3934/mbe.2020180
- Phillipson K, Dimitrova E, Honecker M, Hu J, Liang Q. (2020). Gröbner Bases of Convex Neural Code Ideals (Research). In: Acu B., Danielli D., Lewicka M., Pati A., Saraswathy RV, Teboh-Ewungkem M. (eds) Advances in Mathematical Sciences. Association for Women in Mathematics Series, vol 21. Springer, Cham.
- Sullivan J, Charalampidis EG, Cuevas-Maraver J, Kevrekidis PG and Karachalios NI. (2020) Kuznetsov-Ma breather-like solutions in the Salerno model. Eur. Phys. J. Plus, 135:607
Polymath 2021
Mar 22, 2021
Featured Articles
Nothing Stops Mathematics
Not even a global pandemic could interrupt studies of Coarse Ricci Curvature, connectivity in the brain, and Gross-Pitaevskii equations, among others.
Letter from the Chair
Ben Richert reviews a year like no other in the history of the Math Department.
Math Clubs Stay Connected
Clubs create an important sense of belonging for Cal Poly students. With the loss of pizza parties and in-person meetings during the pandemic, the four clubs in the Math Department have gotten creative to stay connected.
In Memoriam
May 24, 2019
Howard Steinberg, Math Professor from 1970 to 1991
Howard Steinberg passed away on November 3, 2018. He was 89. Howard was born and raised in New York City and graduated from City College in engineering. After his career in engineering and aerospace development, he earned his master’s and doctoral degrees in applied mathematics in 1969 from the Courant Institute of New York University.
Steinberg was hired as an associate professor of mathematics at Cal Poly in 1970. He taught here until his retirement in 1991. While at Cal Poly, he oversaw the graduate math program. He loved teaching and still had contact with many students who had completed advanced degrees in math.
Upon retirement, Steinberg founded Howard Steinberg Photography. He was a member of the San Luis Obispo Museum of Art, the Sierra Club and the San Luis Obispo Land Conservancy.
His family was his priority. He is survived by his wife of 45 years, “Biz” Steinberg, three children and their spouses and five grandchildren. Steinberg’s Celebration of Life was held at the Santa Margarita Ranch Barn on December 9, 2018. Read Steinberg's full obituary.
Alberto Jiménez, Math Instructor from 2001 to 2013
Following a distinguished career in software programming, Alberto Jiménez retired to San Luis Obispo. He came out of retirement to teach for the Mathematics Department for 12 years. He taught multiple courses, from calculus to numerical analysis. Read Jiménez's full obituary.
Exams and Explorations
May 23, 2019
From the Putnam exam to research in conics, the readability of proofs and more, Cal Poly math majors increased their mathematical skills, excelled against some tough competition and created new mathematical knowledge doing research.
Cal Poly Places in top 10% at Putnam Exam Competition
The Cal Poly team of Joel Pion, Sam Lindbloom-Airey and Jason Brown placed 54th out of 568 institutions participating.
The best individual scores were:
- Joel Pion with 20 points and a rank of 619 out of 4,623 students participating
- Sam Lindbloom-Airey, 17 points, rank 708
- Nore Vellandi, 10 points, rank 1,157
- Jason Brown, 5 points, rank 1,437.5
- Weston Grewe, 4 points, rank 1,576.5
- Sean Gonzales, 2 points, rank 2,182.5
- Sergio Aguayo, 1 point, rank 2,720
- Kyle Rachman, 2 points
- Frederick Streetman, 2 points
- Logan Burrington, 1 point
- Kaitlyn Harechmak, 1 point
- Perrin Silveira, 1 point
Congratulations to our team and all of the students who did so well!
The national results are available on the Mathematical Association of America website (spoiler alert — Harvard won).
Summer Research Groups Investigate Conics, Matrices, Learning Proofs and More
Professors Bonini and Pearse with Conor Carroll, Catie Corwin, Uyen Dinh, Sydney Dye and Joshua Frederick
Erin Pearse and Vince Bonini supervised a student research team in the Faculty and Undergraduate Research Student Teams program at CSU Fresno during summer 2018. The team continued to work together during fall quarter at Cal Poly. The students received an outstanding poster award for their presentation at the Mathematical Association of America (MAA) student poster session at the 2019 Joint Mathematics Meetings. They are also working on a paper titled Coarse Ricci Curvature of Complete and Strongly Regular Graphs.
The research was supported by the National Science Foundation and the Frost Fund.
Professor Brussel with Joel Pion and Ryan Zesch
Elliptic curves are a deep area of mathematics with many surprising applications to real life, including cryptography and prime factorization. Pell conics are a special type of conic curve, such as a unit circle. They are the less studied little brother of elliptic curves, with many of the same properties and applications. Our work focused on describing the group structure of pell conics over various rings, and the adaptation to pell conics of some well-known elliptic curve encryption and prime factorization algorithms. This work — titled Curves, Conics and Cryptography — was presented as a poster at the MAA meeting in February.
Professor Champney with Surabhi Agrawal, Chad Collins and Julissa Magana
Chad Collins, Surabhi Agrawal and Julissa Magana worked on a summer project titled Examining Students' Perspectives on Analogies in Abstract Algebra. This research was an extension of Magana and Collins' senior project, as well as independent work that Collins started in winter 2018. The team collected data on and studied students’ use of analogies in making sense of new and difficult Math 481 material, and ultimately extended their findings to describe analogy types, design curricular activities and implications that could use analogies, and more.
Professor Champney with Joelle Saute and Kathryn Voltmer
Joelle Saute and Kathryn Voltmer worked on a summer research project titled Group Effectiveness and Questioning Processes in an IBL (Inquiry Based Learning) Math Classroom. This research was an extension of Saute’s senior project and her work to gain a more in-depth look at how group effectiveness and group questioning of self and peers may or may not be linked. The initial research was supported by a Cal Poly Baker/Koob grant.
Professors Grundmeier and Retsek with Shannon Cardoza and Tommy Giang
Thanks to support from the Frost Fund, this research group explored readability in the context of mathematical proof. Readability is an essential component of proof writing because a completely valid argument is useless if it is entirely incoherent to the reader. Definitions of readability in a mathematical context, however, are limited and vague.
Our work sought to pinpoint which characteristics of a proof contribute predominantly to its readability, specifically in the setting of introductory proofs courses. Additionally, mathematics education research has shown that proof assessment is a subjective process. Therefore we also sought to investigate the role that readability plays in proof assessment.
Professor Patton with Mackenzie Cox, Weston Grewe and Grace Hochrien
The research group worked on a project titled Numerical Ranges of 4 by 4 Nilpotent Matrices. The numerical range $W(A)$ of a matrix $A$ is a convex set in the complex plane. If $A$ is 4 by 4 and nilpotent, then $W(A)$ has at most two line segments on its boundary. This group found families of matrices that show every angle between these line segments is possible. We also found conditions guaranteeing symmetry about given lines through the origin. We used properties of an algebraic curve associated with $W(A)$. Weston and Professor Linda Patton are continuing this work to try to prove some conjectures motivated by our examples.
Additional research groups included:
- Professor Camp with Raymart Ballesteros, Tobias Iven and Brian Knight
- Professor Stankus with Grant Bernosky, Cameron Frederickson, Timothy Royston and Alexa White
- Professor Gu with Chase Peak and Jordan Rowley
Math Department Frost Summer Undergraduate Research Showcase Projects
- Optimal Transport, Coarse Ricci Curvature, and Some Applications
- Uyen Dinh (with FURST students, Dr. Bonini and Dr. Pearse)
- Curves, Conics, and Cryptography, Oh My!
- Joel Pion and Ryan Zesch (Dr. Brussel)
- Fingerprints of the Pleistocene Glacial Cycles
- Tobias Iven (Dr. Camp)
- Glacial Cycles and the 100 Kyr Problem
- Raymart Ballesteros and Brian Knight (Dr. Camp)
- Group Effectiveness and Questioning Processes in an IBL Math Classroom
- Joelle Saute and Kathryn Voltmer (graduate student) (Dr. Champney)
- Examining Students’ Perspectives on Analogies in Abstract Algebra
- Chad Collins, Surabhi Agrawal, and Julissa Magana (Dr. Champney)
- Readability in the Context of Introductory Proofs Courses
- Shannon Cardoza and Tommy Giang (Drs. Grundmeier and Retsek)
- Unitary Equivalence for Tensor Products of Linear Operators
- Chase Peak and Jordan Rowley (graduate student) (Dr. Gu)
- Flat Portions on the Numerical Range of a 4z4 Nilpotent Matrix
- Mackenzie Cox, Weston Grewe and Grace Hochrein (Dr. Patton)
- Recognizing Overlapping Handwritten Digits Using Neural Networks
- Cameron Frederickson, Grant Bernosky, Timothy Royston, and Alexa White (Dr. Stankus)
Bringing Math to the World
May 23, 2019
A panel of alumni met with current graduate students to share information on the career and educational options made possible by a graduate degree.
Cal Poly math faculty and students engage in teaching and learning mathematics in many ways outside the classroom. From increasing inquiry-based learning in higher education to helping lead the math club at a local elementary school to scholarly publications and presentations, the department is making an impact in the world of mathematics.
Faculty and Student Conferences, Workshops and Notable Research
In 2018, Danielle Champney and Todd Grundmeier led National Science Foundation (NSF)-supported workshops on inquiry-based learning in Torrance, California, and Washington, D.C., respectively. The workshops were part of a five-year, $2.8 million collaborative research project between Cal Poly and the University of Colorado Boulder that focuses on increasing the use of research-based teaching practices at the college level.
More than 50 college mathematics instructors from institutions across the U.S. and Canada attended the four-day workshops. To date, more than 400 faculty across the nation have participated in an inquiry-based learning workshop led by Cal Poly faculty.
Stan Yoshinobu, Katie Kahle and Winston Chang from the Academy of Inquiry Based Learning provided workshop administration and logistical support. Sandra Laursen from the Ethnography and Evaluation Research unit at the University of Colorado Boulder led the research and evaluation support.
Grundmeier and Elsa Medina offered a Noyce summer workshops for 25 mathematics teachers. The work is funded by an NSF Noyce Grant.
In 2018, Emily Hamilton and Joyce Lin organized a Mathematics Masters Career Panel for graduate students with alumni Shelby Burnett, who teaches at Cuesta College; Caleb Miller, who is currently a graduate student at University of Colorado Boulder; and James Hall, who works at Amazon. Panelists had lunch with the graduate students and held an open-question career panel for all advanced math majors and graduate students.
Goro Kato gave a talk titled “P-Adic Oka Coherence Theorem” in October and November 2018 at Shizuoka and Waseda universities.
Math majors Julissa Magana and Randolph Mercado facilitated the Pacheco Math Club (PMC) at Pacheco Elementary School in San Luis Obispo during the 2018-19 academic year. PMC is a weekly, after-school math club for 25 students in grades three through six. The program aims to promote a growth mindset in students, especially students who feel discouraged or need a boost in math.
The students and Pacheco Elementary teachers Danielle Elsea, Mercedes Pascual and Cindy Peters co-facilitated hands-on activities on topics such as place value, geometry, fractions, math games and math derived from stories. The activities shared a common focus of doing math in a low-stress, fun and supportive environment, which helped students develop a better understanding and connection to math. This project is funded by the College of Science and Mathematics and led by Rick Mayfield, director of learning and achievement for San Luis Coastal School District, and Professor Stan Yoshinobu.
Elsa Medina, Amélie Schinck-Mikel and liberal studies students Emily Mapa and Adriana Vazquez gave a presentation titled “Opening the Door to 3D Visualization through Multiple Representations” at the California Mathematics Council (CMC) Central Conference in March. Math credential students and liberal studies math concentration students Baylee Wickham, Nicole Linman, Robyn Amendola and Kelsey Genasci attended the CMC North Conference in December 2018.
In October 2018, Linda Patton gave an invited talk on joint work with Caixing Gu titled “A Composition Operator Norm Upper Bound on Multivariable Reproducing Kernel Hilbert Spaces” at the American Mathematical Society sectional meeting in San Francisco.
Patton also worked with math major Jason Brown to study subsets of the C-numerical range of a matrix $A$. The C-numerical range of a matrix A is a set (not necessarily convex) generated by all matrices unitarily equivalent to $A$. They studied the sets generated when the unitary matrices were restricted to certain subgroups.
Brown showed that some symmetry results for the C-numerical range also hold for the special subsets and described some cases when the subsets are simply connected. They worked on plotting these subsets as well as the entire C-numerical range; these plots involve difficult optimization. Brown presented his work at the Spring 2019 Mathematical Association of America meeting at AIM.
Mathematical Association of America’s Golden Section Meeting
Several students attended the Mathematical Association of America’s Golden Section Meeting, which covers northern California, Nevada and Hawaii. See below for photos of the students with the posters they presented.
Brian Knight and Raymart Ballesteros
Joel Pion and Ryan Zesch
Jason Brown
Faculty Publications
P. Ashwin, C. D. Camp, A. S. von der Heydt. “Chaotic and non-chaotic response to quasiperiodic forcing: limits to predictability of ice ages paced by Milankovitch forcing.” Dyn. Statis. Clim. Syst. (2018) 1-20, doi:10.1093/climsys/dzy002.
V. Bonini, S. Ma, and J. Qing. “Hypersurfaces with Nonnegative Ricci Curvature in Hyperbolic Space.” J. Calc. Var. (2019) 58-36, doi:10.1007/s00526-018-1471-2.
V. Bonini, S. Ma, and J. Qing. “On Nonnegatively Curved Hypersurfaces in Hyperbolic Space.” Math. Ann. 372 (2018) 1103-1120, doi.org/10.1007/s00208-018-1694-8.
V. Bonini, J. Qing, and J. Zhu. “Weakly Horospherically Convex Hypersurfaces in Hyperbolic Space.” Annals of Global Analysis and Geometry. 52(2) (2017) 201-212.
S. Burnett, A. Chandler, and L. J. Patton. “Symmetric numerical ranges of four-by-four matrices.” Involve 11(5)(2018) 803–826.
G. Kato. “Fate Changing Door Knock by a Great Mathematician.” Tokyo, Iwanami-Shoten, Jan. 2019.
E. Z. Medina and A. G. Schinck-Mikel. “Dog, Double Dog!” ComMuniCator, California Mathematics Council. March (2019).
Faculty Awards
Vince Bonini and Erin Pearse received a $49,000 grant from the NSF FURST program, which was a collaborative project with CSU Fresno.
Young Alumni Establish Scholarship to Advance STEM
May 23, 2019
Nick (Mathematics and Computer Science, ’02) and Katie (Statistics, ’01) Dellamaggiores started giving to Cal Poly the year after they graduated. Their support has grown over time, and they now fund a scholarship available to math, computer science and statistics majors. Below, the Dellamaggiores discuss what inspired them to give back.
Interview with the Dellamaggiores
What inspired you to start donating to Cal Poly so soon after you graduated?
We received tremendous value from our Cal Poly education and are very grateful for the practical experience we gained there and the job opportunities it has provided us. With the cost of education rising so significantly since we graduated, we felt that now is the right time to start helping and motivating the next generation in their pursuit of quality higher education.
What do you find rewarding about providing student scholarships?
We just love knowing that we’re helping great students in their academic journey. We also enjoy attending the yearly awards banquet to meet and converse with the next generation of students.
The name of your scholarship is "Scholarship for the Advancement of Science and Technology." How do you see your gift contributing to that advancement?
Math, statistics and computer science majors are eligible for the scholarships. Those happen to be the majors Katie and I graduated with. These fields provided us with a great foundation for our impactful careers in the technology industry. Today, these fields are even more relevant given the intense demand for data science, AI, software engineering and cryptography expertise in both industry and academia. We hope these scholarships will attract bright minds that will continue the advancement of STEM.
What Cal Poly experience has been most influential in your life?
We really enjoyed opportunities to practice Learn by Doing by working for on-campus departments. For example, Nick had an amazing internship with the Library Multimedia Group, where he gained experience building real software systems for on-campus clients. Katie had an opportunity to work with the Natural Resources Management Department doing data analysis on real-world data.
Letter from the Chair 2019
May 22, 2019
Since this is my first newsletter as department chair, let me take a moment to introduce myself. My name is Ben Richert, and I came to Cal Poly in 2003. In 2011 I became the undergraduate coordinator for the department and worked closely with the two previous chairs. I can say without reservation that I inherited a well-functioning department with a great reputation on campus from my predecessor, Joe Borzellino. Joe has recently taken on a new and much-needed role on campus as the director of enrollment management.
There is quite a bit of good news to share. First, the $110 million gift from William and Linda Frost continues to benefit the department. We support student-faculty research for 13 math students during the academic year. Baseball analytics, the Witt Ring, the Riemann Sphere and machine learning are among their research topics. This summer will see an additional 20 projects led by nine faculty advisors. These are unique opportunities for Cal Poly undergraduates to develop skills that prepare them to enter industry, graduate school or a credential program. And it’s just good clean fun!
There is also exciting news concerning our graduate program. Students earning a master’s in mathematics from Cal Poly have been successful applying to prestigious doctoral programs or attaining employment at community colleges. We plan to strengthen the path from our degree to positions in industry by adding the option of an applied math specialization.
Our vision involves expanding the applied coursework and developing internship partners. To help with the staffing side of these goals we recently conducted a fantastically successful search, and we are happy to announce that two new tenure-track colleagues in applied mathematics will join us next fall, Elena Dimitrova and Stathis Charalampidis. Watch this space for official introductions upon their arrival.
Finally, let me offer one observation from a newbie. Like the rest of the faculty, I was aware that much of what the department is able to accomplish is due to donations. With the vantage point provided by my new position, however, I am astounded and humbled by the generosity of our donors. On behalf of the faculty and students, let me again offer our sincerest thanks for helping the Mathematics Department meet its critical goals.
Please do keep in touch — we love to hear news, especially in person. If you're in town, please drop by the office to say hello.
