2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Board 406: The Transformation of a Mathematics Department

Presented at NSF Grantees Poster Session

We describe the deliberate changes made since 2005 in our department and how those changes have affected every aspect in the department for our faculty, staff, and students. The external fundings by various federal agencies, including the S-STEM funding from the National Science Foundation, have played important roles to transform our department for the better. The improvements include:

* inclusion and understanding the needs of faculty, staff, and students
* building a community and an atmosphere where everyone feels comfortable and has a sense of belonging
* mutual respect among faculty, staff, and students
* synergy among faculty, staff, and students
* student mentoring not just by faculty but also by staff, industrial mentors, and peer mentoring by students
* using financial and other resources optimally but generously for student success
* initiation of programs and activities benefiting students
* building good relationships with other mathematics departments in Texas, in the neighboring states, and also in the nation

We share the lessons learned and the best practices developed during the transformation, and we explain how the external fundings have helped us for the transformation.

Authors

Prof. Tuncay Aktosun http://orcid.org/https://0000-0003-1094-5676 The University of Texas at Arlington [biography]

Dr. Aktosun is a professor of mathematics at the University of Texas at Arlington. His research area is applied mathematics and differential equations with research interests in scattering and spectral theory, inverse problems, wave propagation, and integrable evolution equations. He is involved in various mentoring and scholarship programs benefiting students. He was the GAANN Fellowship Director in his department during 2006-2022, he has been the NSF S-STEM Scholarship Director in his department since 2008, and he also acts as the Project Director for the NSF Bridge Program in his department. In the past he served as the Graduate Director and as the Undergraduate Director in his department, and he directed the NSF-LSAMP program on his campus during 2009-2014 and also directed the NSF-LSAMP Bridge-to-Doctorate program on his campus during 2010-2013.
Dr. Yolanda Parker Tarrant County College District [biography]

Dr. Yolanda Parker's education includes earning a Bachelor of Science from Texas A&M University in Applied Mathematical Sciences, a Master of Arts in Liberal Studies from Dartmouth College (New Hampshire) and a Ph.D. in Mathematics Education from Illinois State University. She has been an educator for over 25 years and has been full-time faculty at Tarrant County College-South Campus for over 10 years in the Mathematics Department where she primarily teaches Statistics and Math for Teachers courses. She is a contributing author for the books A Commitment to Teaching: Toward More Efficacious Teacher Preparation; The Brilliance of Black Children in Mathematics: Beyond the Numbers and Toward a New Discourse; and Mathematics Teaching, Learning and Liberation in the Lives of Black Children. She is a co-author for the books Engaging in Culturally Relevant Math Tasks: Fostering Hope in the Elementary Classroom and Engaging in Culturally Relevant Math Tasks: Fostering Hope in the Middle and High School Classroom.
Prof. Jianzhong Su http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6103-3936 The University of Texas at Arlington [biography]

Dr. Jianzhong Su is professor and chair of Mathematics at the Department of Mathematics, University of Texas at Arlington (UTA). He received his Ph.D. in 1990 from University of Minnesota under Professor Hans Weinberger and he has been in higher education

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