UMKC Department of Mathematics and Statistics What's New News and Events Department

UMKC Department of Mathematics and Statistics

What's New
about the Department?

[Department Publicity, Professional News & Events,
Graduate Programs, Course News,
Faculty News (Honors, Grants, Accomplishments, etc.)]

2008

2007

2006
Graduate Seminar Series
(Fall and Spring only)
Expository Talks, and Videos Series
(Fall and Spring only)
All Previous News and Events together, 2001-2005

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2008

30 May 2008: We hear that Dr. Jie Chen is promoted to full professor. Congratulations, Jie!
28 April 2008: The department had its Chair election this month, and Dr. Jie Chen was elected Chair. She was then approved by the Dean who recommended her to the Provost, who in turn appointed Dr. Chen for a three-year term starting July 1. Congratulations, Jie! We are grateful to and wholeheartedly thank Dr. Peng for his excellent work as Interim Chair this past year.

2007

27 August 2007: Dean Karen Vorst joined us at our department Faculty Meeting in an informative visit, to see us all face-to-face as well as tell us about updates to the College budget model. Ours was the first department she chose to visit this year.
30 July 2007: On Monday July 30 from 9:00 am - 2:00 pm, we held our first GTA Teaching Workshop, organized by one of the GTA Supervisors, Dr. Liana Sega. This event replaced the annual Orientation gathering held the last three summers for all Adjunct Lecturers and Graduate Teaching Assistants teaching in the department during the Fall. In addition to distributing general and specific information about department policies and the courses they will teach, and just getting to know them, we had each participating GTA give a 25 minute lecture, which was then criticized by both Dr. Sega and Dr. Richard Delaware, as well as the other GTAs present. We also shared pizza, and generally discussed various teaching issues.
1 July 2007: The College of Arts and Sciences Dean appoints, as Interim Chair of the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Zhonghua "Josh" Peng, Professor of Chemistry.
30 May - 1 June 2007: Dr. Liana Sega was invited to and participated in a workshop at the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute of Berkeley, CA, titled "Critical Issues in Education: Teaching Teachers Mathematics".
20-23 May 2007: Dr. Rekab traveled to Shanghai, China to give two talks (concerning work co-authored with Dr. Xin Yan) on interdisciplinary mathematical and statistical techniques.
5 April 2007: Dr. Kamel Rekab was elected the 2007-2008 President of the Kansas Western-Missouri chapter of the ASA (American Statistical Association) at their Spring Meeting in Manhattan, KS.
3 March 2007: Dr. Richard Delaware gives two invited talks on the History of Mathematics for the University of Western Washington, Bellingham, WA, at the Whatcom and Skagit Mathematics Partnership Mini-Conference, part of the MathNEXUS project.

2006

16 October 2006: For the first time in the history of our department, we are pleased to host the 2006 Fall Meeting of the Kansas Western-Missouri Chapter of the ASA (American Statistical Association). Our Chair Dr. Kamel Rekab is currently the Vice President of the chapter. At dinner the speaker Dr. Morgan C. Wang of the Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science at the University of Central Florida discussed Maxiumum Likelihood Regression Trees. Members attended from:

Quintiles, Pittsburg State University, EMB Statistical Solutions, Kansas State University, Hallmark, University of Kansas Medical Center, H&R Block, PRA International, AAFP, Commerce Bank, Midwest Research Institute, UMKC, and elsewhere.
25 September 2006: Dean Karen Vorst joined us at our department Faculty Meeting in an informative visit, to see us all face-to-face as well as tell us about upcoming changes to the College budget model.
11 August 2006: We are pleased to welcome this Fall to our department two new Biostatisticians, Xin Yan, as an Associate Professor, and Mark Gamalo as an Assistant Professor. Follow their links to read about their strong and very different backgrounds. We also welcome for the 2006-2007 academic year, Visiting Professor Venkatesulu Mandadi from India, whose field is Differential Equations.
12 July 2006: On Wednesday July 26 from 3:00-4:30 pm in Royall Hall 206 we'll hold our third annual Orientation gathering for all Adjunct Lecturers and Graduate Teaching Assistants teaching in the department during Fall 2006. In addition to distributing general and specific information about department policies and the courses they will teach, and just getting to know them, we invite guests from the Math Resource Center and Arts & Sciences Academic Advising. [For a complete listing of mathematics courses and instructor assignments for Fall 2006 see Current Semester Course Schedules.] As a department we continue this annual meeting to encourage from our entire "extended" faculty consistency and a high quality of teaching in all our courses.
9 May 2006: Over this semester, we have completely re-written both our Master of Science (MS) degree program, with emphasis in either Mathematics or in Statistics, and our IPhD degree program effective Fall 2006.
27 April 2006: Our Chair Dr. Kamel Rekab, is elected Vice President of the Kansas Western-Missouri chapter of the ASA (American Statistical Association) at their Spring Meeting in Manhattan, KS.
April 2006: The new, mandatory "Mathematics Entrance Tests" written by our department on the Blackboard program for Math 110 (College Algebra), Math 206 (Brief Calculus and Matrix Algebra), and Math 210 (Calculus I) begin to be taken by Summer 2006 students, and students preparing for Fall 2006.
24 April to 2 May 2006: Our department is featured a second time on the UMKC home page with a slide show and press release about our recent work with the School of Education in creating "Mathematics for Teachers" courses. Take a look!
15 April 2006: Our department is featured on the UMKC home page with a photograph of our Chair Kamel Rekab and an article outlining the progress we have made in the last two years. Take a look!
April 2006: We hear that full-time faculty member and statistician Yong Zeng has been awarded an NSF grant for three years beginning June 1, for a project entitled "Statistical Analyisis of the Filtering Models with Marked Point Process Observations: Applications to Ultra-High Frequency Data." The "data" referred to is financial trade-by-trade (or transaction) data, and this project can have important economic applications. Congratulations Yong!
31 March 2006: Richard Delaware gives the invited Keynote Address for the Annual Spring Conference of MOMATYC/KAMATYC in Kansas City.
21 March 2006: Richard Delaware and Fall 2005 Adjunct Lecturer Joe Huber are honored at the 3rd Annual Activity & Program Council's UMKC Faculty and Staff Appreciation Day luncheon, having been nominated by one or more students they teach, advise, or mentor, for having made a positive impact in their lives. [On 25 March 2005, Richard Delaware was previously honored, and on 23 April 2004, both Jie Chen and Rebecca Roberts were so honored.]
1 February 2006: Go to our Summer 2006 Schedule of Mathematics and Statistics classes to see our offerings this summer. Pass the word! In addition to the usual sections of Math 110 - College Algebra, the Calculus I, II, III sequence (Math 210, Math 220, Math 250), Math 206 - Brief Calculus and Matrix Algebra, and Math 235 - Elementary Statistics,

Summer 2006 Highlights:
- Math 590 - Statistical Design of Experiments New Course! Only 5 weeks
- Math 517 - Matrix Theory I First time offered in Summer!
  
  Undergraduate courses
- Math 345 - Ordinary Differential Equations New evening time! (MTWR, 6:00-7:50 pm)
- Math 116 - Mathematics for Liberal Arts Two sections, evening times! (MW or TR, 6:00-8:45 pm)
- Math 120 - Precalculus (Are you prepared for Calculus I in the Fall?)
- Math 130 - Mathematics for Teachers: Number Systems
18 January 2006: Our Department Graduate Committee makes extensive (and exciting) revisions to our Master of Science (MS) degree program, with emphasis in either Mathematics or in Statistics, effective Fall 2006. Our graduate program continues to evolve to meet the needs of our students and the community!