AGENDA
- Call to Order
- Chair's Remarks
- Announcements
- Mathday – Jim Morrow
- Math Hour – Julia Pevtsova
- Analysis core classes – Isabella Novik
- Committee Reports
- New Business
- Executive Session
- Adjournment
MINUTES
The regular meeting of the faculty of the Department of Mathematics was held in C-36 Padelford Hall at 3:30pm, January 29, 2019. John Palmieri, Chair, presided at the meeting. Rose Choi was recording secretary.
The meeting began with approval of the previous meeting’s minutes.
Chair's Remarks
Professor Palmieri reported that the CAS budget was healthy and may lead to an increased faculty replacement rate of 1 to 1. Additionally, next year’s enrollment goal for the University is 7,000 new students.
The Postdoc Unionization efforts have affected the usage of the current titles ascribed to the department’s Acting Assistant Professors. An official title has yet to be established.
Announcements
Mathday is scheduled to take place on March 25, 2019. Professor Morrow is in need of more volunteers. Currently there are at least 1,600 high school students signed up to attend.
Professor Novik proposed combining the Complex and Real core classes into one core Analysis class—one quarter Complex Analysis and two quarters Real Analysis. This can be done experimentally for two years after which point a new vote can be held to either keep the revamped format or revert back to the original structure. The rationale for the change was four-fold:
- Low enrollment.
- Few are ready to teach 3 quarters of Complex Analysis, but plenty can teach 1.
- Students in Probability, Manifolds, etc. will benefit from exposure to Complex Analysis.
- Fosters a sense of community with higher enrollment.
A poll taken of graduate student reactions to the switch was largely positive with some worrying that the proposed syllabi would be too tight.
The proposed structure of the Analysis Prelim would then be:
- 3 problems in Complex Analysis
- 6 problems in Real Analysis
- Cleanly solve 4 to Pass
A vote was held to approve the two-year experiment along with the restructured prelim. All were in favor of the proposal.
ADJOURNMENT
There being no new business, the meeting passed into executive session at 4:07pm.