Graduate committee session reports
Current liason to the Graduate Committee: Mike Hilgemann.
- 10/7/08 Graduate Committee Meeting report:
-----------------------------------------------
The main topic addressed at this meeting was diversity and how to recruit minority and international graduate students to the department. Wolfgang attended this meeting and talked about two possible sources for more work with such students, Puerto Rico and Bolivia. In regards to Puerto Rico, Wolfgang brought up the idea of teaming up with two of the major universities in Puerto Rico on grant proposals and with forming some sort of student exchange program with them. This may include students from ISU studying in Puerto Rico for a semester or year, and vice versa. In regards to Bolivia, Wolfgang expressed concern that there was no comparison data for students from Bolivia coming to the US. Hence there would be some difficulty in determining what criteria to use in possibly accepting Bolivian students into the program.
- 9/30/08 Graduate Committee Meeting report:
-----------------------------------------------
The committee discussed the wording for the descriptions of the Math 591/592 courses that will be included in the next university course catalog. They decided to feature teaching at the university level and communicating mathematics as the topics for Math 591, and introduction to research areas and professional expectations for Math 592. Wolfgang Kliemann attended and asked the committee to formulate a governing document, including specifics for tied votes, non-tenure track faculty voting, and the graduate student representative.
- 9/23/08 Graduate Committee Meeting report:
-----------------------------------------------
The Graduate Commitee discussed award and fellowship solicitations, and agreed on an e-mail to be sent to grad students and faculty about the nomination and application processes. A separate e-mail will be sent out about Departmental/Graduate College awards and the Wolfe Research Fellowship, including nomination and application procedures. Nominations for the awards are due by Monday, October 6. Applications for the Wolfe Fellowship are due by Friday, October 31. If a student is planning on applying for this fellowship, he/she should inform the Graduate Committee of this by October 6. Eligibility criteria and award amounts are included in the e-mail. A website will be set up on the Mathematics Department website with all of this information as well. The commitee also discussed a method for graduate students to apply for travel funding, including the various sources of funding. This will be discussed again at the next meeting.
- 4/21/08 Graduate Committee Meeting report:
-----------------------------------------------
The committee discussed final changes to the proposal being put before the faculty involving changes to the catalog and the graduate program. The committee will recommend switching the semesters that Math 502 and Math 503 are offered - Math 503 to be offered in the Fall and Math 502 in the Spring. The committee also discussed deleting Math 505 and Math 516 from the list of courses covering the qualifying exams. Dr. Smith was present and argued that doing so would restrict how Math 504 and 505 were taught. The commitee decided to recommend that no mention be made in the Graduate Handbook as to what courses were meant to prepare for particular qualifying exams, instead just stating that the qualifying exam syllabi were the definitive list of topics to be covered. Also, due to some concern from Applied Math faculty, there will be a second option to lower the number of credits required of Ph.D. students. The first option will be the previous suggestion that 42 (plus 1 for the seminar) math credits be required with 6 credits of cognates. The second option will be that 36 (plus 1) math credits be required, 6 cognate credits be required, and the other 6 credits must be from any 500+ level course, regardless of department. It would allow for some students to take more cognates and others to only take the necessary 6 credits. Both options will be brought before the faculty. Lastly, the committee decided recommend lowering the required math credits for comajors to 24.
- 03/31 Graduate Committee Meeting report:
-----------------------------------------------
There has not yet been a consensus on whether to change the Math 502/503 course descriptions or schedule of when to offer these classes. Dr. Sacks will look into it more and have it ready by the time the course change recommendations are given to the full faculty. The committee also discussed what to do in the situation that a graduate student who has already taken the First Year Graduate Seminar in a previous semester wishes to graduate under the new requirements that require Math 591/592. The committee decided to consider exemptions on a case by case basis. Lastly, the committee discussed possibilities of how to use the excess funds in certain awards. One idea was to given travel awards for graduate students travelling to present at conferences. Instead of one large award, multiple smaller awards would be given for this, and possibly multiple times per year. They will contact the families of the donors of these awards with this idea.
- 03/24 Graduate Committee Meeting report:
-----------------------------------------------
The Graduate Committee finalized proposed changes to the graduate credit requirements from last meeting, including a change of the applied mathematics core courses and lowering the cognate requirements to 6 with slightly stricter requirements on such courses. Cognate courses will still be required to be 'relevant to the major' but cross-listed courses must be taught by a faculty member outside the department. Due to the applied math core change, the committee will look into rearranging the scheduling of Math 517, Math 557, Math 502/503, and Math 666 so that more core course fall into the spring semester. The committee also discussed excess funds on certain awards and the possibility of giving multiple awards.
- By Mike Hilgemann: Committee 03/10/08 summary
-----------------------------------------------
The Graduate Committee began discussing possible changes to the graduate credit requirements, as suggested by the external review. First they discussed the possibility of reworking the First Year Graduate Seminar into a required seminar for first-year graduate students, taken for 1 credit, that focuses on teaching, research, and other aspects of being a graduate student in the Mathematics Department. The Committee also discussed possible ways to lower the required classroom credits for the Ph.D. program, as suggested by the external review. One idea was to the lower the cognate credits required from 12 to 6 and tightening the eligibility requirements for such courses. These topics will be discussed again at the next meeting, after Spring Break.
- By Mike Hilgemann: Committee 2/18/08 summary
-----------------------------------------------
The committee finalized changes to the graduate course catalog that they will send to the faculty. Math 618 will be changed to Representation Theory, and the description made as flexible as possible to allow for different topics. The course will be repeatable - if a student takes the course with a different topic of emphasis, he or she can take it as a 690 course for credit. As for the description of Math 504/505, the committee recommended the description remain as it is.
- By Mike Hilgemann: Committee 2/4/08 summary
-----------------------------------------------
Changes to the graduate catalog from last week were discussed and approved. For now, the descriptions for 504 and 505 will be left as one description, with 505 being described as a continuation of 504. The changes are now ready to be sent to the faculty for approval. Changes in the policies of the TOEFL requirement were also discussed. No changes were considered for now, but the committee will keep an eye on incoming graduate student applications to see whether a change is needed or the if the requirements should be lowered to recommendations.
- By Mike Hilgemann: Committee 1/28/08 summary
-----------------------------------------------
The Graduate Committee agreed to meet with the graduate students as part of the First Year Graduate Student Seminar, scheduled for March 26th. Many changes to the graduate catalog were discussed. The committee agreed that multiple courses needed small description changes, including Math 517, 519, and 557. They also decided to break the current description of Math 504/505 into two separate descriptions for each semester. Also, Math 618 may be changed from its current standing as Boolean Algebras to a course in Representation Theory. All of these catalog changes will be brought before the faculty at a later meeting. Core course requirements were also discussed for the Applied Mathematics degree, with a possible change to two seperate blocks of courses much as the current course requirments for Algebra and Analysis.
- By Mike Hilgemann: Committee 12/3/07 summary
-----------------------------------------------
Course catalog changes were again discussed. Such changes will be addressed during Spring semester, including wording of catalogs descriptions, frequency of course offerings, and course requirements. Options for Summer 2008 graduate course offerings were also discussed. One of the frontrunners at this point is a course in Approximation Theory.
- By Aaron Allen: Summary of Graduate Committee Meeting 11/12/07:
-----------------------------------------------
During the first part of the meeting, the committee discussed minor changes to be made in the graduate catalog. Modifications they discussed included updating prerequisites and updating the cross listings for certain courses. As far as the graduate credit proposal goes, the committee is not sure whether or not the proposal will even go through. Ryan told me that some in the department thought there would be a number of conflicts with this proposal. In addition, they do not want to make a definite decision on it until they get the report from the external review committee, and they don't know when they will get the external committee report. If they do pass this proposal, their goal is to have it take effect starting the Fall 2008 semester. The current students can follow the guidelines of this new proposal if they have not taken any cognates by August of 2008, but if they have taken any cognates, they must fulfill the requirements of the old rules. I informed the committee that the vast majority of the graduate students are in favor of the proposal.
Iowa State University Department of Mathematics, 396 Carver Hall, Ames, Iowa 50011
Copyright © Iowa State University of Science and Technology. All rights reserved.
Non-Discrimination Statement and Information Disclosures