[*Concerns of Young Mathematicians*] Corrected -- Summer Edition

[Emil Volcheck]

[Our apologies: the previous mailing had some bad links.  Here is a
corrected version.  Thanks for your patience, Sincerely, The Editors ]

             *Concerns of Young Mathematicians*

                   Summer 2005 Edition
 

     An electronically distributed digest for discussions
     of the issues of concern to mathematicians at the
     beginning of their careers.

The views expressed here do not necessarily represent those of the
administrative board or membership of the Young Mathematicians'
Network.  The editorial policy of this newsletter is to encourage
discussion of issues and facilitate the dissemination of information
relevant to the concerns of young mathematicians.

Please visit the Young Mathematicians' Network Scoop site at

    http://concerns.youngmath.net

to join the discussion or submit stories.  You may also direct
submissions and questions by writing to <moderator at youngmath.net>.

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Editorial

Hello Again!

You've probably been wondering what happened to your monthly edition
of Concerns this spring.  We at YMN had some technological issues to
grapple with and that kept us from sending out regular newsletters.
Thanks to everyone who kept on top of things, reading and posting on
our website during the layoff.  We've fixed our web problems and will
be sending out issues more regularly now.

In this digest you'll find some great postings from the last six
months.  There's an article on frustrating problems with using
technology in teaching (no, the irony is not lost on us), a new poll
about how long it takes to get a tenure-track job, and "breaking news"
on the Goldbach Conjecture.  Several people have also pointed out
fascinating math-related pieces in other media outlets including a PBS
piece on higher education, an interview with error-correcting code
pioneer Richard Hamming, an overview of math-blogs.  We hope you enjoy
these articles as well as the others which have been posted in the
last few months.

This year has seen several changes on the YMN Board.  Karrolyne Fogel
and John Kuchenbrod have stepped down after many years of service - we
owe thanks to both of them for their dedication.  New to the Board
this year are three members: Brian Birgen, Josh Laison, and Vanessa
Garcia.  They've already been busy posting interesting articles and
reflections and we thank them for volunteering.

YMN is again sponsoring several panel discussions at MathFest, which
begins in under a month in Albuquerque (see below for more info.)  We
hope to see you there or online.  As always we look forward to hearing
your thoughts and concerns.

dave

YMN Grand Poobah

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YMN activities at MathFest

By dkung 

Posted Along with the MAA Committee on Graduate Students, YMN is
sponsoring a series of panel discussions at MathFest in Albuquerque in
August. Included are sessions on How to Apply for Jobs, Negotiating
with the Administration, and the First Year Experience as a Faculty
Member.

For details visit

      http://concerns.youngmath.net/story/2005/7/11/152445/518 

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Richard Hamming on Research 

By Emil Volcheck <http://concerns.youngmath.net/user/Emil%20Volcheck>  
Posted Mon May 2nd, 2005 at 15:00:40 PDT 

At a talk in 1986, Richard Hamming, the BellCore researcher who was a
pioneer of error-correcting codes, gave a talk addressing the question
``Why do so few scientists make significant contributions and so many
are forgotten in the long run?'' The transcript to this talk is well
worth reading.

For the full transcript and to share your thoughts and comments visit

    http://concerns.youngmath.net/story/2005/5/1/204355/1924 

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Declining by Degrees 

By brianbirgen <http://concerns.youngmath.net/user/brianbirgen>  

PBS recently aired a special called "Declining by Degrees" about the
state of higher learning in the U.S. It is billed as a revealing
documentary into the world behind the "ivy-covered walls".

For more details and to share your thoughts and comments visit

    http://concerns.youngmath.net/story/2005/6/28/133817/036 

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Goldbach Conjecture Disproved 

By overconvergent <http://concerns.youngmath.net/user/overconvergent>  

In an email message today to the Number Theory mailing list, a
counterexample to the Goldbach Conjecture - that every even number
bigger than 2 can be written as the sum of two prime numbers - was
announced. The method is said to involve the Hardy-Littlewood circle
method and to use a magma computation that took several weeks to
complete. (The actual, "marvellous" counterexample is too big to fit
into this posting).

A senior number theorist said, under the condition of anonymity,
"we're in shock. No-one saw this coming."

For more details and to share your thoughts and comments visit

    http://concerns.youngmath.net/story/2005/4/1/1049/96275 

[Editor's note: you may want to note the date of this article.]

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When Technology Attacks 

By overconvergent <http://concerns.youngmath.net/user/overconvergent>  

When I last gave a talk the overhead projector was suffering (as was
I) from unseasonable hot weather, and it kept breaking down. This made
me think about technology and the problems it causes while teaching.

For more details and to share your thoughts and comments visit

    http://concerns.youngmath.net/story/2005/6/25/144540/891 

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Math blogging ... and the PhD 

By overconvergent <http://concerns.youngmath.net/user/overconvergent>  

There are a few math and education bloggers that I read quite
regularly - Moebius Stripper <http://talldarkandmysterious.ca/>,
a Canadian who has been teaching in British Columbia, Learning Curves
<http://learningcurves.blogspot.com/>, who also teaches math,
Erin O'Connor <http://erinoconnor.org/>, who doesn't teach math but
was a professor at Penn until she left to teach at a private high
school (here
<http://www.erinoconnor.org/archives/2004/01/doing_the_math.html>
is an interesting post by Prof. O'Connor on mathematics), and
Joanne Jacobs <http://www.joannejacobs.com/>, who is also not a
mathematician but has interesting things to say about education
generally.

For more details, links, and to share your thoughts and comments visit

    http://concerns.youngmath.net/story/2005/5/21/11840/4439 

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___________________________________________________________

Closing Credits

The YMN Board:

Scott Berger           berger at math.rice.edu 
Kevin Charlwood        kevin.charlwood at washburn.edu 
Dov Chelst             chelst at math.rutgers.edu 
Karrolyne Fogel        kfogel at clunet.edu 
James Hamblin          jehamb at ship.edu 
Lloyd Kilford          ljpk at its.caltech.edu 
Chawne Kimber          kimberc at lafayette.edu 
John Kuchenbrod        jkuchen at member.ams.org 
David Kung             dtkung at smcm.edu 
Michael Lang
Heather Ames Lewis     halewis at naz.edu 
Kim Roth               kroth at wju.edu 
John Vano              jvano at math.wisc.edu
Vanessa Garcia         vanessagarcia63 at gmail.com

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