AIM’s first event in Africa
In partnership with Maseno University, AIM ran the workshop Open source mathematics curriculum and assessment tools in Kisumu, Kenya, August 5-9, 2024.
This workshop focused on strengthening the impact of open educational technologies on learning mathematics across the curriculum. The gathering emphasized turning contextual challenges into opportunities, across multiple academic levels, at a broad spectrum of institutions and on multiple continents. Participants included practising mathematicians, teachers, mathematics education researchers, and experts in the creation, development, and implementation of open educational technologies. Activities were aimed at creating high-impact cross-institutional and international collaborations.
Middle: Professor Julius Nyabundi, Vice Chancellor of Maseno University, speaking at the opening ceremony. Clockwise from upper right: workshop co-organizer Michael Obiero discussing issues of mathematics instruction in Kenya; the workshop participants; David Stern outlining research directions for the workshop.
2024 Alexanderson Award
AIM is pleased to announce the winners of the 2024 Alexanderson Award: The paper “Energy on spheres and discreteness of minimizing measures,” by Dmitriy Bilyk, Alexey Glazyrin, Ryan Matzke, Josiah Park, and Oleksandr Vlasiuk and published in the Journal of Functional Analysis in 2021 was selected for recognition.
The award will be given at the Joint Mathematics Meetings Awards Celebration, to be held from 4:45 p.m.-5:45 p.m. on Wednesday, January 8, 2025 in Seattle. Dmitriy Bilyk will deliver the AIM Alexanderson Award Lecture at the JMM on Thursday, January 9 from 10:50 a.m.-11:55 a.m.
Math Fair for AIM’s 30th Birthday Celebration
On Saturday, June 29, 2024, an estimated 700 students, friends, parents, and kids of all ages joined the AIM staff, trustees, board members, and volunteers for a day of mathematical fun, games, puzzles, prizes, and treats. The event was free and open to the public. Along with the twenty or so math games and activities there was a face painting booth, snow cones, and ice cream bars. There was also a taco truck that did a brisk lunch business. The support of the Caltech community was terrific and helped make the day a great success.
Congratulations to Rina Foygel Barber!
On October 4, 2023, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation announced the 2023 MacArthur Fellows. Among this distinguished group is Rina Foygel Barber, Professor of Statistics at the University of Chicago and a member of AIM’s Scientific Research Board. Rina was also the organizer of an AIM SQuaRE. For a brief description of her work see the MacArthur Foundation announcement.
AIM has moved to Pasadena!
After more than two decades in the Bay Area, AIM has moved to its new home on the Caltech campus in Pasadena. On July 10, 2023, AIM began operating in the new Richard Merkin Center for Pure and Applied Mathematics, a research center and conference space that has been established in connection with AIM’s move to Caltech, with support from Richard N. Merkin and the Merkin Family Foundation.
More information can be found under Visitors in the main menu above and also in the original announcement of the new AIM-Caltech partnership.
Math activities for students, teachers, families — just about everyone!
AIM’s Math Communities website has a new calendar of upcoming math activities you can take part in.
Math that feels good
Creating learning resources for blind students
Martha Siegel, Professor Emerita from Towson University in Maryland, was working with a blind student who needed a statistics textbook for a required course. The Braille version of the textbook required six months to prepare, a delay which caused the student a significant delay in her studies. Siegel reached out to Al Maneki, a retired NSA mathematician who is blind, and the two of them decided to do something about it.
Focusing on math textbooks initially, Siegel and Maneki pulled together a collaborative team intent on solving the problem. “We were shocked to realize there did not already exist an automated method for producing mathematics Braille textbooks,” said Alexei Kolesnikov, a colleague of Siegel at Towson University and member of the team. Read more…
