Annual Faculty Activity Reports
In this section, I list the highlights from my annual faculty activity reports (teaching, research, and service) over the academic years from fall 2017 to spring 2023 while I was assistant professor of mathematics at Florida Southern College.
2022 - 2023 (Sixth Year at Florida Southern College)
Highlights:
I continued to serve on one of Florida Southern's standing committees, the Academic Standards, Assessment, and Improvement Committee (since 2020). I served as a subcommittee chair to oversee 6 other faculty review student artifacts. I divvied up roughly 100 artifacts among the 6 faculty to review and compiled a report summarizing the data on the artifacts that were collected by my team. My report, along with other subcommittee reports, were then compiled into a final report by the chair of the committee.
I offered a new course in the spring called Geometry and its History. The department even voted to replace their existing Proof Techniques course with Geometry and its History. The course included an overview of some Greek history leading up to Alexander the Great and the creation of the city of Alexandria, where Euclid wrote his The Elements. We delved into the contents of the The Element and studied many of the proofs within the first book. We also discussed the flaws in Euclid and introduced the modern way of presenting geometry via incidence relations (giving rise to finite geometries) and then including betweenness, congruence, and continuity. An emphasis was also made on the different parallel postulates.
I maintained the role of faculty advisor to the Math Club.
I set up a Math Club event on October 25, 2022, that hosted two students that had previously completed a Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU). The event was aimed at getting the word out about these REU opportunities and how to apply to them. The students also described what their role in the project and what skills were learned from their experience. I also created flyers for the event.
I mentored an independent study with a student on preparation for the first actuarial exam P. I am registered to take the exam in November.
I mentored an independent study with Riley Peters (computer science) and Lucas Clemens (chemistry) on abstract algebra. This was initiated by me, once Riley had told me about his interest in learning abstract algebra. I asked Lucas to join as I knew he would also benefit greatly from the course. We discussed many examples of group structures including modular arithmetic and cosets.
I mentored an independent study with Anthony Koenig (Biology) on calculus 3. I was approached by a colleague about this student and that they wanted to pursue taking the course before graduation.
I completed my application for tenure in January 2023.
Throughout my time at Florida Southern, I had been collaborating with Bojko Bakalov, Victor G. Kac, and Ivan Todorov on a project initiated by them and one that was a continuation of my dissertation work. After overcoming many technical difficulties, our paper titled “orbifolds of lattice vertex algebras” (105 pg.) has been published on February 28, 2023 (and is also described in the Publications section).
2021 - 2022 (Fifth Year at Florida Southern College)
Highlights:
In this year, Florida Southern College made efforts to update their departmental websites. Previously, the math department had little to no presence online. I volunteered to gather information about our departmental activities and reached out to some alumni for testimonials.
I offered two new courses in the spring semester: Cryptography and its History, and The Math behind Finance (which I co-taught with James Farrell, Associate Professor of Finance).
I took over as the faculty advisor to the Math Club. I worked with the officers in making the Math Club an official student organization on campus. I also worked to create several events such as a "welcome back coffee and donuts" and an event showcasing students' experiences who have completed a Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU).
I was a team mentor for the 2021 SCUDEM Challenge Using Differential Equations Modeling. The team consisted of Nathan Hallmark, Max Barlow, Luke Clemens. As part of the event, the students recorded their presentation.
KRYPTOS is a student competition in which the goal is to break 3 successively harder ciphers. In the spring semester, while I was teaching Cryptology and its History, two of my students in that class, Nathan Hallmark and Alivia Baxman, competed in the KRYPTOS competition. It turned out they were able to correctly solve the first 2 ciphers.
I completed a virtual "Professional Development Initiative" at Florida Southern on flipped classroom strategies, hosted by Matthew Eicholtz (Computer Science), Susan Serrano (Mathematics), and Hope Holley (Education).
On March 19, 2022, I attended the ASPiRE (Advancing Student Participation in Research Experiences) conference at Florida Gulf Coast University. At the time, I was still working with a student (Nathan Hallmark) on some formula identities he discovered. Nathan gave a talk at ASPiRE on his updated work. I have continued collaborating with Nathan as co-authors to help finish his results (also see the Publications section).
I attended the virtual Joint Annual FL-MAA & FTYCMA Meetings and gave two talks titled “Representations of Lattice Vertex Algebras, Trace Functions, and Modular Transformations” (on February 19, 2022) and “Implementing specifications-based grading in mathematics courses across the curriculum” (on February 18, 2022).
I attended the virtual NSA cryptologic history symposium on May 11-12, 2022.
I attended the virtual Conference on Teaching and Learning (CoTL) at the University of South Alabama and gave a talk titled “Implementing specifications-based grading in mathematics courses across the curriculum” on May 12, 2022.
Bloomberg Market Concepts (BMC) is a self-paced e-learning course that provides an interactive introduction to financial markets. I have completed the course and received a Certificate of Completion.
2020 - 2021 (Fourth Year at Florida Southern College)
Highlights:
I facilitated a virtual breakout sessions during Florida Southern's annual "Fall Faculty Forum" titled “Using the Mastery Gradebook in Canvas”. During the previous summer, I learned how to incorporate learning outcomes with a mastery gradebook offered in Canvas. I was able to use this set up to successfully implement my version of specifications grading in a hybrid, synchronous format.
On March 20, 2021, I attended the ASPiRE (Advancing Student Participation in Research Experiences) conference at Florida Gulf Coast University. At the time, I was still working with a student (Nathan Hallmark) on some formula identities he discovered. Nathan gave a talk at ASPiRE on his updated work.
I joined one of Florida Southern's standing committees, the Academic Standards, Assessment, and Improvement Committee, in fall 2020.
In the previous year, 3 students (Zachary Fralish, Jonathan Marshall, and Nathan Hallmark) submitted a paper titled “Using Differential Equations to Model Phoretic Parasitism as Part of SCUDEM Challenge”. Their paper has been published on January, 9, 2021.
I was invited to be one of three panelists at the Mastery Grading Conference in June 2020. The panel, "All About Reassessments", concerned the use of reassessments in using various forms of mastery grading. See the recording here.
I attended a virtual POGIL writing retreat in July 2020. This workshop provides an opportunity for teachers to spend focused time on developing, writing, and improving POGIL activities with the mentorship of experienced POGIL author coaches. I also met with other faculty interested in helping me to create POGIL activities for calculus 2.
2019 - 2020 (Third Year at Florida Southern College)
Highlights:
On February 1, 2020, I travelled with Roxanne Back (Math, Associate Professor) and about 15 students to the ASPiRE (Advancing Student Participation in Research Experiences) conference at Florida Gulf Coast University. At the time, I was working with a student (Nathan Hallmark) on some formula identities he discovered. Nathan gave a talk at ASPiRE on his work.
I hosted a faculty "Professional Development Initiative" with Christian Roberson (Computer Science, Chair) aimed at faculty interested in mastery based assessment. The meetings were a place faculty could discuss their questions, concerns, and ideas for how they might incorporate the mastery based concept into their classes. There were 7 faculty who completed the PDI and several others who had visited at least one of the sessions.
I wrote a letter of recommendation for a former students, Anthony Stefan, for a summer internship mentoring students as part of the SCUDEM Challenge Using Differential Equations Modeling. Anthony was awarded the internship.
I mentored a senior seminar project with Christian Maglich in the spring 2020. The project was on the Houston Astros sign stealing scandal, which concerned violations of Major League Baseball rules by members of the Houston Astros, who used technology to steal signs of opposing teams during the 2017 and 2018 seasons.
I became the faculty mentor for the Florida Southern chapter of the KME math honor’s society. I worked with others to organize and plan for the annual math department and KME spring banquet. I also met with KME officers to discuss ideas.
In May, 2019, Anthony Stefan, Zachary Fralish, and Bernie Tyson III submitted an article to the Rose Hulman Journal of Undergraduate Mathematics titled "Using Differential Equations to Model Predator-Prey Relations as Part of SCUDEM Modeling Challenge." Their paper has been published in 2019, Volume 20, Issue 2 (and is also described in the Publications section).
The previous year, I submitted a paper with Drew Lewis (USA) titled “Applying a standards based grading framework across lower level mathematics courses.” This paper has been published on October 29, 2019 (and is also described in the Publications section).
I organized a new team of 3 students (Zachary Fralish, Nathan Hallmark, Jonathan Marshal) to compete in the SCUDEM Challenge Using Differential Equations Modeling. I traveled with the team to the Florida Institute of Technology as part of the event.
I mentored those students as they wrote a paper summarizing their work. Their article, titled “Using differential equations to model predator-prey relations as part of SCUDEM modeling challenge”, was submitted to the International Electronic Journal of Mathematics Education in fall of 2019. Their paper was published the following year.
2018 - 2019 (Second Year at Florida Southern College)
Highlights:
I facilitated one of the breakout sessions during Florida Southern's annual "Fall Faculty Forum" titled “Standards-based grading” on Aug. 17, 2018 from 10 – 11 a.m.
I helped to set up the math department's annual Hartje lecture; I brought in Will Cousins, who is a Data Analyst for the Tampa Bay Rays.
I hosted the SCUDEM Challenge Using Differential Equations Modeling on October 27 from 7:30 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
I became an honor’s thesis mentor (fall 2018 – spring 2020) for Andrew Boesenberg; his topic was on measure theory and the mathematics of the Black-Scholes option pricing model.
I mentored the 2017-2018 SCUDEM team (Anthony Stefan, Bernie Tyson, and Zach Fralish) as they wrote a paper presenting their model in the SCUDEM Challenge Using Differential Equations Modeling. The students submitted their paper to the Rose-Hulman J. of Und. Math. (which was later published; see the Publications section).
I submitted a paper in August, 2018, with Drew Lewis titled “Applying a Standards-Based Grading Framework Across Lower Level Mathematics Courses” (which was later published; see the Publications section).
I applied for and received an SGA grant ($300) and a Be Curious grant ($372) from Florida Southern for student travel to the Joint Math Meetings in January, 2019. The conference was in Baltimore that year.
My students to give a talk at the Joint Math Meetings in January, 2019. A video recording of their talk has been posted on the SIMIODE website.
I presented a talk at the Algebra and Combinatorics Seminar at North Carolina State University titled “On the irreducible characters of orbifold lattice vertex operator algebras” (March 4 from 3 – 4 p.m.).
I presented two talks at the Joint Math Meetings in January, 2019, titled “Using Mastery Based Assessment in Lower Level Mathematics Courses” and “Representations of Lattice Vertex Algebras and their Transformations: Examples in Order Three.”
I organized a new team of students to compete in the SCUDEM Challenge Using Differential Equations Modeling on October 27, 2019.
2017 - 2018 (First Year at Florida Southern College)
Highlights:
I became the faculty advisor for the KME honors society in mathematics. I collected student applications and met with KME officers to plan for the annual KME banquet.
I helped plan a new major in Applied Mathematics and filled out several generic syllabi for new courses.
I presented a talk about my use of standards-based grading at the Conference on Teaching and Learning at the University of South Alabama in Mobile, AL (May 7-8th).
I organized a team of 3 students to compete in the SCUDEM Challenge Using Differential Equations Modeling. I traveled with the team to St. Petersburg College to participate in the conference part of the event and present their model. Each team was judged and the Florida Southern team won first place!
I began collaboration with Drew Lewis (USA) on our shared implementation of standards-based grading (which we later published; see the Publications section).