Interesting Interviews on Math Degrees and Higher Math Education

[Sebastian (a lady)]

https://www.wired.com/2017/02/live-best-life-mathematics/

 

If you read between the lines, the things he lists as barriers reveal some about expectarooms for math majors.

[Guest]

Great article! I liked that he discussed math majors at liberal arts colleges.

[plansrme]

Interesting article.  My 19 yo future-math-Ph.D. was actually at every session of the conference where Dr. Su gave this talk.  I don't know that she was in his closing session (she didn't mention it), but between her personal experiences as a budding female mathematician, her observations at this conference and her experience and discussions this past weekend at the "Nebraska Conference for Undergraduate Women in Math" (or something like that), I'm going to throw out some related observations:

 

1.  Her general observation is that a lot of women currently in math have poor people skills:  they don't make eye contact when they speak; they're up-talkers; they are shy, which may mean they're not in their professors' offices during office hours, they're waiting for projects to be offered instead of finding something to do.  You can debate all day long about whether it is misogynistic to expect women mathematicians to have these skills (I mean, you can debate that with someone else; I'm not touching it), but I wonder if that isn't a significant part of the issue.  Regardless of whether this is a reasonable expectation, it is fixable.  We can prepare our young women to speak up for themselves, to be confident in front of groups, to talk like the grown-ups they are instead of the cheerleaders they once were, and to march boldly into a professor's office and ask for help on an assignment.  My daughter is an undergraduate star where she is because of exactly these skills.  She's also smart, but lots of kids are smart.  

 

2.  At the Nebraska Conference, my daughter gave a talk on some research she has done, and one of the students in the audience asked her a question afterwards.  She had not asked it in the Q&A session because, she told my daughter, she wasn't sure if she would sound stupid or if my daughter would know the answer, and she didn't want my daughter to get a question she didn't know.  My daughter told her it was a good question, she did know the answer, and that both of them would have looked smart if the girl had just asked.  That is kind of an amusing anecdote, but it also was very telling.  Can you imagine a male member of an audience holding back on a question for either of these reasons?

 

3.  Many of the attendees were from LACs, and they were jealous of my daughter's option to take graduate-level courses because she is at a research U.  They all seemed to know (and I use "know" loosely, because they may just THINK that they know) that it gives her a leg up on Ph.D. applications.  Dr. Su mentions this, i.e., that grad school admissions committees seem to expect applicants to have already taken graduate-level courses, so I think these students are probably correct that applicants from research Us have an advantage in graduate admissions.  I am of two minds on this.  First, graduate level math is HARD.  Some of it is ridiculously hard.  A program makes a significant investment when it accepts a Ph.D. candidate; I can see the program's giving significant weight to students that they know can handle the rigor and that they know have enough exposure to the day-to-day-life of a research mathematician to know this is what they want to do, on the grounds that those students are less likely to drop out a year or so into their studies.  On the other hand, I do see that it can close off admission to some LAC graduates who are cut out for the rigors of Ph.D. study.  I don't know the answer to this problem--maybe not to go to an LAC if you want to get a Ph.D. in math, or maybe to know that you have to make up for that with a summer REU or a semester in Budapest or some combination thereof.

 

Gotta go; someone needs my laptop.  But in closing, I will say that my daughter, so sample size of one, has never experienced anything that would remotely discourage her from pursuing a career as a research mathematician.  In fact, I refer to her department as a cult and regularly offer to hem her saffron robe because, top to bottom, they've welcomed and encouraged her far more than they had to.  She has interacted with professional math geeks literally all over the world and has received nothing but acceptance and encouragement.  I really think she would read this article and not recognize any parallels with her own experience.  

 

Edit to correct "throw up" to "throw out."  Not quite the same thing.

Edited February 6, 2017 by plansrme

[Bluegoat]

Interesting article.  My 19 yo future-math-Ph.D. was actually at every session of the conference where Dr. Su gave this talk.  I don't know that she was in his closing session (she didn't mention it), but between her personal experiences as a budding female mathematician, her observations at this conference and her experience and discussions this past weekend at the "Nebraska Conference for Undergraduate Women in Math" (or something like that), I'm going to throw out some related observations:

 

1.  Her general observation is that a lot of women currently in math have poor people skills:  they don't make eye contact when they speak; they're up-talkers; they are shy, which may mean they're not in their professors' offices during office hours, they're waiting for projects to be offered instead of finding something to do.  You can debate all day long about whether it is misogynistic to expect women mathematicians to have these skills (I mean, you can debate that with someone else; I'm not touching it), but I wonder if that isn't a significant part of the issue.  Regardless of whether this is a reasonable expectation, it is fixable.  We can prepare our young women to speak up for themselves, to be confident in front of groups, to talk like the grown-ups they are instead of the cheerleaders they once were, and to march boldly into a professor's office and ask for help on an assignment.  My daughter is an undergraduate star where she is because of exactly these skills.  She's also smart, but lots of kids are smart.  

 

2.  At the Nebraska Conference, my daughter gave a talk on some research she has done, and one of the students in the audience asked her a question afterwards.  She had not asked it in the Q&A session because, she told my daughter, she wasn't sure if she would sound stupid or if my daughter would know the answer, and she didn't want my daughter to get a question she didn't know.  My daughter told her it was a good question, she did know the answer, and that both of them would have looked smart if the girl had just asked.  That is kind of an amusing anecdote, but it also was very telling.  Can you imagine a male member of an audience holding back on a question for either of these reasons?

 

3.  Many of the attendees were from LACs, and they were jealous of my daughter's option to take graduate-level courses because she is at a research U.  They all seemed to know (and I use "know" loosely, because they may just THINK that they know) that it gives her a leg up on Ph.D. applications.  Dr. Su mentions this, i.e., that grad school admissions committees seem to expect applicants to have already taken graduate-level courses, so I think these students are probably correct that applicants from research Us have an advantage in graduate admissions.  I am of two minds on this.  First, graduate level math is HARD.  Some of it is ridiculously hard.  A program makes a significant investment when it accepts a Ph.D. candidate; I can see the program's giving significant weight to students that they know can handle the rigor and that they know have enough exposure to the day-to-day-life of a research mathematician to know this is what they want to do, on the grounds that those students are less likely to drop out a year or so into their studies.  On the other hand, I do see that it can close off admission to some LAC graduates who are cut out for the rigors of Ph.D. study.  I don't know the answer to this problem--maybe not to go to an LAC if you want to get a Ph.D. in math, or maybe to know that you have to make up for that with a summer REU or a semester in Budapest or some combination thereof.

 

Gotta go; someone needs my laptop.  But in closing, I will say that my daughter, so sample size of one, has never experienced anything that would remotely discourage her from pursuing a career as a research mathematician.  In fact, I refer to her department as a cult and regularly offer to hem her saffron robe because, top to bottom, they've welcomed and encouraged her far more than they had to.  She has interacted with professional math geeks literally all over the world and has received nothing but acceptance and encouragement.  I really think she would read this article and not recognize any parallels with her own experience.  

 

Edit to correct "throw up" to "throw out."  Not quite the same thing.

 

The questions around the bit I've bolded interest me, in a more general sense.  Specifically it reminds me of the approach our medical school used to take - they only took students from certain majors because they assessed they would be the most fit for the science coursework.

 

What they found though is that tended to get them students with particular skill sets, and missed other skill sets - sometimes ones that were more likely to be interested in areas that were underserved, like family practice.  Once they opened things up to any major, they found the students were still strong - they had to be to do well in the admissions requirements - but they brought a lot of other knowledge and different ways of thinking and interests into the program.

 

LAC tend to be known for producing students with a relatively broad range of knowledge.  I tend to think that is of value as background in any area of specialization, and in an ideal world all undergraduates would have it to some degree, whether they gained it during their coursework or elsewhere.  It can be easy for students at many universities these days to have a very narrow knowledge-set, even when they have required courses outside their major.  I cannot see how that can avoid creating a lot of students who think about things in a similar way.

[Guest]

(I just wanted y'all to know that as someone with a degree in mathematics, I'm completely geeking out over this thread.  LOL)

Edited February 6, 2017 by Kinsa

[plansrme]

And I'm going to add one more thing re. his mention of a "secret menu."  There may well be an unpublished menu, which I understand to mean the unwritten requirements for getting into top Ph.D. programs, but if it is really a secret, everyone is willing to spill it to those who bother to ask.  I know because my daughter has just up and asked what she needs, e.g., whether this grade will make a difference, whether she should take the undergrad version of a class and be pretty sure of an A or take the graduate version with the potential for a B, where she should apply, where she'll get in, what to wear!  Literally, everything she's wanted to know, someone's been more than willing to tell her.  She's had this discussion with a LOT of people, people from three continents, in fact, and everyone has been forthcoming.  At the conference where Dr. Su gave this talk, the head of her department introduced her to some famous (in the mathematical world, that is) math geek at one of the top-5 graduate programs in the U.S.  They chatted a bit about her research, and he said, "When you apply to [insert famous school here], send me an email, and I'll put in a good word for you."  So, (1) he assumed she would be applying there, and (2) he certainly encouraged her doing so--she hadn't volunteered that his department is on her list.  Anyway, again, with my sample size of 1 at 1 school, I don't know what sort of structural barriers he's talking about.  I'm not saying they don't exist, certainly, but even with the lack of structural barriers she's experienced, her graduate-level math classes typically have one or two women out of 20 or 30.  This makes me think the barriers are not necessarily on the institutional side.  Of course, let's talk this time next year, when she has her acceptances and rejections in hand, and I might be singing a different tune!

[Janice in NJ]

I have enjoyed his "Baby Rudin" lectures. This guy is walking the talk. The video quality is horrid, but the beauty of Mathematics comes through.  In the article he says, "And some people experience a kind of transcendent wonder that they’re seeing something true about the universe."

 

Yup! That absolutely happened!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqEyWLGvvdw&list=PL0E754696F72137EC

 

Peace,

Janice

 

Enjoy your little people

Enjoy your journey

 

 

Edited February 13, 2017 by Janice in NJ

[mom31257]

(I just wanted y'all to know that as someone with a degree in mathematics, I'm completely geeking out over this thread.  LOL)

 

I have a degree in math from a liberal arts college, so same here!