Selected Presentations & Appearances
Service to Duke
In my capacity as course supervisor for Math 105L and 106L, I served as part of the math department's consulting for the new SPIRE Fellows program.
Over the summer of 2017, I began developing supplementary online labs for the math department's new Linear Algebra course, Math 218. The labs will use Python and NumPy in an embedded Jupyter environment. Work will be completed by the Summer of 2018 and piloted in Fall 2018.
I updated the 105L/106L lab manual to remove use of outdated graphing calculators, and introduce online tools (especially Google Sheets and Geogebra) for use in Calculus Labs. In the Fall 2017 semester, the new manual was piloted for the first time. Results were excellent: students found the computer-based tools far more intuitive and produced much better work than they did in the past.
Open a new path for less mathematically well-prepared students into the natural sciences at Duke, especially Statistics and Computer Science. The cohort program that is going to result (in Fall 2017) from the committee's work this year will provide ongoing support to low SES students who declare an interest in these subjects and commit to an rigorous program of mathematical study for their first two years at Duke.
These students will begin in my classes (105L and 106L) or Math 111L, then continue to a newly designed linear algebra course after a summer engaged with mathematics through Data+ (or another summer program). By breaking up the traditional calculus track, we hope to show students another aspect of math that they had not previously been familiar with -- many calculus students are not at all aware of math beyond calculus.
This innovative approach to getting students into 'higher' math should enable more STEM-interested students to achieve their ambitions at Duke. Given that my classes have a larger proportion of students of color, low income students, and first generation students than almost all other math classes, this is especially important in increasing access to the sciences for these students, who often feel overwhelmed and left behind by their peers who have had far greater access to resources earlier in their education.
Curriculum Innovations ; Worked with Ben Cooke and Donna Hall at the Academic Resource Center to enhance out-of-class support structures for 105L and 106L students. Efforts include research and application of appropriate diagnostic tools; classification of students into groups that need extra assistance; referrals to support structures at the ARC; advocacy for such students.
Curriculum Innovations ; Rewrote the syllabus for Math 25L and 26L (now 105L and 106L) at Duke to reintroduce discrete probability, and balance out the study of probability with that of differential equations and models using them.
Academic & Administrative Activities
I have served as course supervisor for Math 105L and 106L since 2009. For a number of semester beginning in Fall 2018, I taught Math 218, as well as the associated lab component that I designed and implemented.