Chair’s Message – Spring 2025

Dear Alumni and Friends, 

Welcome to our first electronic issue of our department’s newsletter Math Matters.  Many of you receiving this may be accustomed to reading a hardcopy of Math Matters—in the interest of reaching more of our alumni and friends, we’ve converted to an electronic format.  This conversion will allow us to publish this newsletter twice a year.  The department is buzzing with activity, I’m pleased to share with you some of those exciting developments from this year.  Our students, faculty, and staff (and alumni!) are having an impact at Iowa State and beyond!

Student Success Initiatives 

We are currently in the second year of several initiatives that target faculty and curricular innovations for the benefit of our students.  The department resumed the activities of the Coalition (formerly Center) for Excellence in Undergraduate Mathematics Education in the fall of 2023 and continues today.   We have now completed two iterations of our alternate pathway through first year calculus.  The alternate pathway consists of two new courses covering precalculus and first semester calculus; we’ve seen positive student outcomes in both new courses.  Multiple faculty and graduate teaching assistants are confronting the new challenges and opportunities in mathematics instruction with the advent of AI—large language models such as ChatGPT. 

Alumni Engagement 

Our department’s website underwent a recent redesign as part of the University’s initiative to uniformize the entire ISU web presence.  Our new site includes a page dedicated to our alumni where you can see archived editions of Math Matters.  We’ve initiated a new “Alumni Colloquium”; the next one on May 2 features Al Erisman and will be webcast.  Check out my YouTube channel under the handle @EricsAngle-ISUMath which features interviews with alumni (and friends) who share their professional experiences with our current students.  Finally, if you are on LinkedIn, I would love to connect with you!  Find me under the handle @Eric-Weber-ISUMath. 

Supporting the Department 

Thank you for your support of the department—our students and faculty benefit from your partnership!  Consider a gift to our Mathematics Fund for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching (which funds our teaching development activities), our Mathematics Lecture Series (for bringing high profile speakers to Iowa State), or the Mathematics Development Fund (which supports all our faculty and students in research, teaching, and outreach).  Please visit https://www.foundation.iastate.edu/math.