MAA FOCUS The Newsmagazine of the Mathematical Association of America December 2008 | Volume 28 Number 9 WHAT’S INSIDE 4 ............. Mathematics and Accounting: A Non-Empty Intersection 7 ............. MAA National 2009 Elections Go Green 10 ............ ICME-11: Mexico, Mathematics, and Mariachis 14 ............ Enhancing Diversity in Graduate Education (EDGE) FOCUS_Dec_08_FINAL.indd 1 11/10/08 12:29:28 PM MAA FOCUS December 2008 MAA FOCUS is published by the Mathematical Association of America in January, February, March, April, May/June, MAA FOCUS August/September, October, November, and December. Volume 28 Issue 9 Editor: Fernando Gouvêa, Colby College; [email protected] Inside Managing Editor: Carol Baxter, MAA [email protected] 4 Mathematics and Accounting: A Non-Empty Intersection Senior Writer: Harry Waldman, MAA By Rick Cleary and Jay Thibodeau [email protected] 6 Teaching Time Savers: Working for a Week Please address advertising inquiries to: [email protected] By Bill Fenton President: Joseph Gallian 7 MAA National 2009 Elections Go Green First Vice President: Elizabeth Mayfield, Second Vice President: Daniel J. Teague, 8 What Happens After You Make It to the Tenure Track? Secretary: Martha J. Siegel, Associate By Robert W. Vallin Secretary: James J. Tattersall, Treasurer: John W. Kenelly 10 ICME-11: Mexico, Mathematics, and Mariachis Executive Director: Tina H. Straley By Annie Selden Director of Publications for Journals and Communications: Ivars Peterson 12 Play Review: A Disappearing Number By Barbara A. Jur MAA FOCUS Editorial Board: Donald J. Albers; Robert Bradley; Joseph Gallian; 13 Marcus du Sautoy Hopes to “Turn People On” to Mathematics Jacqueline Giles; Colm Mulcahy; Michael Orrison; Peter Renz; Sharon Cutler Ross; An- 14 Teaching Introductory Data Anaylsis Through nie Selden; Hortensia Soto-Johnson; Peter Stanek; Ravi Vakil. Modeling Workshop By Jean Scott Letters to the editor should be addressed to Fernando Gouvêa, Colby College, Dept. of 14 Enhancing Diversity in Graduate Education (EDGE) Mathematics, Waterville, ME 0490, or by email to [email protected]. 15 In Memoriam Subscription and membership questions should be directed to the MAA Customer 16 The MAA Peru Study Tour Service Center, 800-33-622; email: [email protected]; (30) 67-7800 (outside 19 The Dangers of Dual Enrollment-More Cause for Concern U.S. and Canada); fax: (30) 06-9789. MAA By Theresa A. Laurent Headquarters: (0) 387-500. 20 What We Learned…by Starting a Seminar Series at a Copyright © 008 by the Mathematical Association of America (Incorporated). Small School Educational institutions may reproduce By Isaiah Lankham and Jenny Switkes articles for their own use, but not for sale, provided that the following citation is used: 22 What I Learned…by Using an Online Homework System “Reprinted with permission of MAA FOCUS, in Calculus I the newsmagazine of the Mathematical By Sharon Vestal Association of America (Incorporated).” Periodicals postage paid at Washington, DC 24 2007 Individual MAA Donors and additional mailing offices. Postmaster: Send address changes to MAA FOCUS, 29 Employment Opportunities Mathematical Association of America, P.O. Box 90973, Washington, DC 0090-0973. ISSN: 073-040; Printed in the United States of America. On the cover: “The Dome,” by Mehrdad Garousi. See the description of this image see page 13. Used by the permission of the artist. December 2008 MAA FOCUS AAAS Meeting in Chicago Features Mathematics and Applications By Edward Aboufadel, Secretary of Section A of the AAAS The 009 Annual Meeting of the Amer- Joys of Recreation to the Frontiers of of AMS and MAA for travel support ican Association for the Advancement of Research and SIAM for support of media aware- Science will be held on February –6, (organized by Edward Aboufadel, Grand ness. The AAAS Program Committee is in Chicago, IL. The theme of this year’s Valley State and Patsy Wang-Iverson, genuinely interested in offering symposia meeting is “Our Planet and Its Life: The Gabriella and Paul Rosenbaum on pure and applied mathematical topics Origins and Futures,” which is a nod to Foundation) of current interest, and in previous years the fact that 009 is the 00th anniversary there have been symposia on subjects of the birth of Charles Darwin and the Other symposia that will be of interest to such as mathematics and the brain, quan- 50th anniversary of the publication of the mathematical community include: tum information theory, the changing On the Origin of Species by Means of nature of mathematical proof, and the Natural Selection. Many of the symposia • New Computing Platforms for Data- mathematical analysis of the performance sponsored by Section A (Mathematics) Intensive Science of baseball players. are interdisciplinary sessions that fit this • A New Kind of Scientist: Profes- theme. sional Master’s Education and U.S. The 00 meeting will be February 8- Competitiveness 22, 00 in San Diego. The Steering The Annual Meeting is organized into • Artificial Cells: Models of the Sim- Committee for Section A seeks organizers symposia which have three or more plest Life and speakers who can present substantial speakers, and often a discussant who re- • The Grid, the Cloud, Sensor Nets, new material in an accessible manner to flects on the talks that are given. Section and the Future of Computing a large scientific audience. All are in- A is sponsoring six symposia this year, • Big, Small, and Everything in Be- vited to attend the Section A Committee featuring outstanding expository talks tween: Simulating Our World Using business meeting in Chicago on Friday, by prominent mathematicians. The six Scientific Computing February 3, 009, at 7:45 PM, where symposia sponsored by Section A this • Providing Science Advice to the we will brainstorm ideas for symposia. year are: U.S. Congress: Is a New Paradigm In addition, I invite you to send me, Needed? and encourage your colleagues to send The Mathematical Twists and Turns of • The Evolution of Knowledge Pro- me, proposals for future AAAS annual Data Sets duction: Exploring Creativity, In- meetings. I can be reached at aboufade@ (organized by Robert Ghrist, University novation, and Networks gvsu.edu. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign) • Earth’s History and Future Revealed at the Frontier of Scientific Comput- Steering Committee for Section A Games People Play: Challenges of Ap- ing February 2008 to February 2009: plying Mathematics and Computers to • K- Engineering Education in the Games United States Chair: William Jaco (organized by Bob Hearn, Dartmouth • Inquiry or Direct? Research-Based (Oklahoma State University) College) Practices in Science Education Chair-Elect: Keith Devlin • Interdisciplinary Approaches to the (Stanford University) Climate and Disease: Quantitative In- Study of Large-Scale Human Net- Retiring Chair: Carl Pomerance sights and Interdisciplinary Challenges works (Dartmouth College) (organized by Mercedes Pasqual, Univer- • The Science of Kissing Secretary: Edward Aboufadel sity of Michigan) (Grand Valley State University) The above symposia are only a few of the Green, Gene, Growing Machines: The nearly 00 AAAS program offerings in Members at Large: Evolutionary Shaping of Plant Form the physical, life, social, and biological (organized by David Baum, University sciences. For further information, includ- Mary Beth Ruskai of Wisconsin) ing the schedule of talks, go to http:// (Tufts University) www.aaas.org/meetings. David Isaacson Mathematical Biology, the New Frontier: (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute) Educating the Next Generation AAAS annual meetings are the show- Claudia Neuhauser (organized by Bonnie Shulman, Bates cases of American science, and they en- (University of Minnesota) College) courage participation by mathematicians Warren Page and mathematics educators. Section A (City University of New York) Mathematics of Origami: From the acknowledges the generous contributions 3 MAA FOCUS December 2008 Mathematics and Accounting: A Non-Empty Intersection By Rick Cleary and Jay Thibodeau Most people see mathematics Patterns, Deviations and and accounting as closely related Separating Examples subjects: both are quantitative fields that involve problem solving, and a Mathematicians see themselves as student with an exposure to only entry experts in pattern recognition. When level topics in each area would very a mathematician discovers a new reasonably conclude that they have a object, it is of course compared to great deal in common. A high school known cases, and then deviations algebra course and a first bookkeep- from the known forms are studied ing course, for example, each involve most carefully. Indeed, deviations learning some algorithms that, when lead to new classifications, and a correctly applied, lead to a specific search for generalization leads to result that is the unarguably cor- decision rules about how to classify rect answer; one that can in fact be objects. Separating examples become checked in the back of the book. a stock in trade, one that we expect students to learn even in first year When confronted with evidence of courses in calculus. (“Can you give this perception, for example when a an example of a continuous function new acquaintance says, ‘Oh, you’re that is not differentiable?”) in math? My sister-in-law is great at math, she’s an accountant,’ many Similarly, external auditors looking at mathematicians cringe. They look for the financial statements of a company some way to explain that we work in Cartoon by John Johnson or institution have many details to a field that requires great creativity consider, but at the core, they face and insight, as opposed to just book- innovation led to the creation of associ- what is very simply a binary-choice keeping. In a similar way, professional ated applied mathematical problems in problem: Either the financial statements accountants praised for being ‘good risk management, interest theory, and are free of material misstatement, or with numbers’ are quick to point out that modern actuarial science. they are not. And, if they are not, they there is much more to their work than require that some type of adjustment be just number crunching.