Volume 46 Number 1 2019 The Australian Mathematical Society Gazette David Yost and Sid Morris (Editors) Eileen Dallwitz (Production Editor) Gazette of AustMS, CIAO, E-mail: [email protected] Federation University Australia, PO Box 663, Web: www.austms.org.au/gazette Ballarat, VIC 3353, Australia Tel: +61 3 5327 9086 The individual subscription to the Society includes a subscription to the Gazette. Libraries may arrange subscriptions to the Gazette by writing to the Treasurer. The cost for one volume con- sisting of five issues is AUD 118.80 for Australian customers (includes GST), AUD 133.00 (or USD 141.00) for overseas customers (includes postage, no GST applies). The Gazette publishes items of the following types: • Reviews of books, particularly by Australian authors, or books of wide interest • Classroom notes on presenting mathematics in an elegant way • Items relevant to mathematics education • Letters on relevant topical issues • Information on conferences, particularly those held in Australasia and the region • Information on recent major mathematical achievements • Reports on the business and activities of the Society • Staff changes and visitors in mathematics departments • News of members of the Australian Mathematical Society Local correspondents submit news items and act as local Society representatives. Material for publication and editorial correspondence should be submitted to the editors. Any communications with the editors that are not intended for publication must be clearly identified as such. Notes for contributors Please send contributions to [email protected]. 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For more information, see An Introduction to Computer Images at delta-intkey.com/www/images.htm. Deadlines for the Gazette are 1 February for No. 1 (March), 1 April for No. 2 (May), 1 June for No. 3 (July), 1 August for No. 4 (September), and 1 October for No. 5 (November). For more information, visit www.austms.org.au/gazette. Volume 46 Number 1 2019 2 Editorial Sid Morris 3 President's Column Jacqui Ramagge 6 Puzzle Corner 56 Peter M. Higgins 9 Talking Teaching Edited by Diane Donovan, Birgit Loch and Sid Morris 13 Learning and Teaching Diane Donovan 15 An interview with Bob Anderssen conducted by Phil Broadbridge 33 The 2018 Simon Marais Mathematics Competition Anthony Henderson 35 Report on NSW ANZIAM Branch Meeting 2018 M.I. Nelson 39 Joint ANU/CSIRO Seminar on Computational and Inverse Problems M.I. Nelson 43 Central limit theorems for dynamic random graph models Liam Hodgkinson 51 Mathematical Research Institute MATRIX David Wood 54 SMRI News Anthony Henderson 59 News 75 AustMS David and I welcome you to the first issue for 2019 of the Gazette of the Aus- tralian Mathematical Society. This is a bumper one and so some items have had to held over until the May issue. One reason for this is the inclusion this issue of a fascinating interview, conducted by Phil Broadbridge, with Bob Anderssen, one of the first members of the Australian Mathematical Society. 2019 began with some significant changes. We have a new President of the Aus- tralian Mathematical Society, Professor Jacqui Ramagge, and a new Director of the Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute (AMSI), Tim Brown. In her Pres- ident’s Column, Jacqui covers a variety of topics including the inaugural teaching awards, university prerequisites and student numbers studying maths at year 12, ARC issues and the new AustMS Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Committee. We have a new regular column by Professor Diane Donovan, the new Vice-President (Learning and Teaching). Diane discusses the Teaching Excellence Awards. She also refers to the depth and breadth of the Mathematics Education Special Sessions at the AustMS annual meeting. Another regular column in the Gazette is now the report on the activities of the newly established Sydney Mathematical Research Institute (SMRI). There is an interesting article in Talking Teaching by Caz Sandison. Caz provoca- tively asks when referring to students not attending classes: “What are we worried about? Students can do OK without attending our classes.” As usual we have The Puzzle Corner, and News from around the universities of visitors, promotions, departures and appointments and conferences. We note that the conference section in the News is complemented by the report from MATRIX and the visitor section in the News is complemented by the report from SMRI. In the AustMS News nominations are called for the 2019 Australian Mathematical Society Medal, and the 2019 Gavin Brown Prize. Applications are called for the Alf van der Poorten Travelling Fellowship. The Secretary of AustMS, Peter Stacey, also reports on the winners of the various prestigious Society prizes. In this issue we have an article penned by the winner of the B.H. Neumann Prize. Sid Morris, Adjunct Professor, La Trobe University; Emeritus Professor, Federation University Australia. Email: [email protected] Sid Morris retired after 40 years as an academic. He received BSc (Hons) from UQ in 1969 and PhD from Flinders in 1970. He held positions of Professor, Department Head, Dean, Deputy Vice-Chancellor, CAO and CEO. He was employed by the universities:Adelaide, Ballarat, Flinders, Florida, La Trobe, UNE, UNSW, UQ, UniSA, Tel-Aviv, Tulane, Wales, and Wollongong. He was Editor of Bull. AustMS and J. Research and Practice in IT, and founding Editor of AustMS Lecture Series and J. Group Theory. He has been on the Council of AustMS for 25 years and its Vice-President. He received the Lester R. Ford Award from the MAA. He has published160 journal papers and 4 books for undergrads, postgrads and researchers, plus an online book, translated into 8 lan- guages and supplemented by YouTube videos and a Facebook group of 7,000 members. In 2016 he was ordained as a Rabbi and in 2019 he edited the book: Topological Groups: Advances, Surveys and Open Questions. He enjoys spending time with his two grandchildren. Jacqui Ramagge* This is my first column as President of the Society and, not for the first time, I am reflecting on what an amazing job Kate Smith-Miles has done as President. I would like to thank her for all her hard work in the role. Kate has left a lasting legacy for the Society in the form of various initiatives including: the establishment of an Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee; the establishment of the position of Vice-President (Learning and Teaching); the establishment of Teaching Awards; the introduction of (very entertaining as well as informative) debates at the Annual Meeting; and the redesign of our website to meet our current and future needs. Kate also started the process of preparing the Society for the inevitable day when we can no longer rely on income from publications to subsidise our activities. This will involve developing a financial strategy. The first step has been the establishment of an Investment Committee, chaired by Nigel Bean, which has made recommendations to Council. In order to implement those recommendations there will need to be a pooling of some resources between the Society’s publication arm, AMPAI, and the AustMS. It turns out that this is not straightforward. This will delay the full implementation of the Investment Committee’s recommendations by about a year but we are nevertheless on our way to a more sustainable future. In looking for alternative sources of income we have also revisited the possibility of obtaining charitable status for the Society. We have been declined charitable status in the past, but we will be investigating whether our increased profile in funding member activities would make another application more likely to succeed. It was great to see the inaugural recipients of the Teaching Awards being honoured at the Society’s Annual Meeting in 2018. Given the role that teaching plays in the survival of the mathematical sciences both intellectually and financially, it is high time that we acknowledged and rewarded those whose contributions in this aspect of our work are particularly notable. It is important to remember that every winner of our awards needs to be nominated in order to be considered. Please consider nominating colleagues for each of our awards and prizes. This is particularly important for junior colleagues as our recognition can make a difference when it comes to appointments and promotions. As I write this, children are going back to school and we are sorting through university admissions, so that mathematical education in schools is at the forefront of my mind. The Chief Scientist, Dr Alan Finkel, has been raising the issue of mathematical preparation in schools just as the University of Sydney is admitting the first cohort of students this millennium into STEM and Business courses with mathematical prerequisites. Enrolments in the higher levels of maths at high school in NSW were decreasing and enrolments in HSC General Mathematics were ∗Email: [email protected] 4 President’s Column increasing during the period 2014–2016.