Faculty Advisor to Student Groups

Faculty Advisor to the KME Math Honor's Society (2018 - 2019)

In the 2018-2019 academic year, I became the faculty mentor for Florida Southern's Kappa-Mu-Epsilon (KME) math honor’s society. I took this role to cover for the absence of our chair at the time. I worked with our administrative assistant to organize and plan the annual math department and KME spring banquet in April. I also met with the KME officers to discuss ideas about theme and activities to have during the event.

Faculty Advisor to the Math Club (2021 - 2023)

In fall 2021, I became the faculty mentor of Florida Southern's Math Club, which was under a set of new officers consisting of Brennan Walsh (president), Anna Abell, Jacob Knox, and Teagan Michalek. When I became the advisor to the Math Club, it was not an official student organization on campus. Previously, our majors would rarely get together and never hosted academic events. My role in getting a group of student officers together was to be intimately involved in setting up events and allow the students to make decisions. like how they want our members to interact online and presence on social media platforms. The officers and I had a GroupMe chat where we discussed matters with upcoming events and meetings. We also met once each month all together.

Since I became the advisor, I routinely worked together with the officers and our chair in creating events that the Math Club could host. Among the events created is a "welcome-back donuts and coffee" event we first hosted in January 2022 and again at the beginning of each semester. We also hosted a "final exam review session" for the math majors in each of those semesters, where we provided food and drinks. I will describe these events and others the Math Club hosted as well as future events I would have hosted. In fall 2022, the president graduated and was replaced by Jacob Knox. Also in fall 2022, the Math Club was founded as an official student organization on campus, and I become its first faculty representative. Since then two new officers joined, Blake Carter and Maya Brown.

Donuts and Coffee

At the beginning of each semester since fall 2021, the Math Club hosted a coffee and donuts event. The Math Club officers and I set up a table outside the doors of Polk Science breezeway with coffee and donuts (which I would pick up and bring to campus). As the students passed by us, we offered them happy returns and aimed to recruit new members. There were several biology majors who were surprised to hear about a Math Club and that they could join. Below are some pictures of the event.

A "Mini Blast Off" Event as part of the Hidden Figures "Passport Event" at Florida Southern

In fall 2022, Susie Banks (FSC, biology) organized a showing of the movie Hidden Figures to connect diverse learning communities on campus. It was also presented as a "passport program" for the freshman. STEM student groups were invited to promote themselves prior to the showing to interact with other students as a way to recruit new members. We set up a table with a game to lauch a projectile into a target with candy prizes. The projectile and target mimics the concepts seen in the movie, where the NASA agents are trying to calculate the "go-no-go" of the trajectory (a two-step verification process that uses two boundary conditions: pas the go condition and also fail the no-go condition). 

I also had a small display of “Euler’s method”, which is referred to at the end of the movie Hidden Figures. The diagram allowed me to briefly describe how the idea involves estimating the solution to a differential equation using a series of line segments, and that it will be important toward the end of the movie.

As the students walked around, we tried to get their emails to get notices of our future events. Below are some pictures of the game.

A "Research for Undergraduates" (REU) Event

In fall 2022, the Math Club invited two students to come talk about their experiences completing a research experience for undergraduates (REU). It is difficult to get accepted to an REU, and we wanted other students to hear how these students were able to successfully apply. Each student talked about their overall project, their role within that project, and what benefits they have gained. In addition, they described the process to apply, where to find possible REU’s, and how to apply to them. Some of the students who attended had never heard of the REU before, and wished they knew of it sooner. 

I hope that hosting events like this will enlighten more students to the research possibilities and how to get involved. Below is a picture of the event (one of the students is an FSC alumni and is talking virtually from WA, the other student was currently at FSC and is seated at the front).

Final Exams Review

At the end of each semester (since fall 2021), the Math Club hosted a final exam review. This event was only for the math majors and was another opportunity for the Math Club to become known. We ordered several pizzas along with drinks and cookies or other dessert. Several of the faculty also come to the event and remain available for any questions or to host their own review.

Future Events

In the future, possible Math Club events include:

• Inviting students (or alumni) who have completed an REU to talk about their experiences;

• Inviting alumni who are in industry to come talk about their day-to-day job and how math has been beneficial for them in their position;

• Hosting social events such as a game night or movie night;

• Inviting a speaker to come talk about the importance of math in their field or discuss a new and interesting topic;

• Getting a Math Club bowling team together to compete in intramural bowling, or other sports team competition;

• Hosting a pi-day event in March (3.14 mile-long race along with pies available for purchase and a ticket price for entering the race).