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Joint Meetings:
I will be attending the 2009 Joint Meetings in Washington, DC. Please contact me if you would like to arrange an interview.

Talks

Audience: Undergraduates, Middle School Students, and Middle School Educators

2008

1. How to Play (and Win) Connect Four
Wash U Math Circles for Middle School Students
Abstract: Playing strategy games like Connect Four and Tic-Tac-Toe with your friends can be fun. The game can be even more fun if you know the perfect strategy that ensures you'll never lose. We will try to determine that perfect strategy for Tic-Tac-Toe and Connect Three and then explore strategies for Connect Four. Once you leave the talk, you should be able to take on any of your friends in Tic-Tac-Toe or Connect Three and never lose!
2. The Difficult Task of Ensuring Fair Elections
Wash U Teachers' Circle for Middle School Teachers
Abstract: It's spring and time for your annual class field trip. This year your students can choose between hiking, skiing, and bicycling. Each student is given a slip of paper on which they rank the three activities in their order of preference. For example, Jennifer prefers hiking to both skiing and bicycling and she prefers skiing to bicycling, so on her slip of paper Jennifer writes:

1. Hiking
2. Skiing
3. Bicycling

After you collect the slips of papers, you look through them and must decide which activity has won the vote. We will explore different methods of counting the ballots and try to determine the fairest counting method. We will see that the ballots can be counted in a variety of ways that may lead to a variety of winners
3. The Difficult Task of Ensuring Fair Elections
Wash U Math Circles for Middle School Students
Abstract: It's spring and time for your annual gym class field trip. This year you can choose between hiking, skiing, and bicycling. Each student is given a slip of paper on which they rank the three activities in their order of preference. For example, Jennifer prefers hiking to both skiing and bicycling and she prefers skiing to bicycling, so on her slip of paper Jennifer writes:

1. Hiking
2. Skiing
3. Bicycling

The teacher collects the slips of papers and now must decide which activity has won the vote. We will explore different methods of counting the ballots and try to determine the fairest counting method. We will see that the ballots can be counted in a variety of ways that may lead to a variety of winners.

2007

1. Mathematical Elegance in an Art Museum
Wash U Undergraduate Math Club
Abstract: Suppose the manager of a museum wants to make sure that at all times every point of the museum is watched by a guard. The guards are stationed at fixed posts, but they are able to turn around. How many guards are needed? We will see how a single clever idea can take this possibly difficult problem and make it easy. We will also give an introduction to "mathematical induction," which will help us turn the clever idea into an elegant proof.
2. The Shape of Space
Wash U Math Circles for Middle School Students
Abstract: A very small ant on a very large donut might just as easily think it's standing on a sphere or a flat table top. Why is that?

Have you ever considered what it might be like to be a square living in a sheet of paper? The square can only move in two directions and can never move out of the sheet of paper and into our 3-dimensional world.

Suppose you had a very fast spaceship that could travel much faster than the speed of light and suppose you left Earth and flew as fast as you could towards a very distant star. Would you be surprised if you arrived at that star and found that you were back at Earth?

These questions have motivated scientists and mathematicians alike for thousands of years. We will explore all of these questions using pictures, games, and videos.

2005

1. A Taste of Counting Problems
Wash U Math Circles for Middle School Students

2004

1. Mathematical Elegance in an Art Museum
Wash U Undergraduate Math Club
Abstract: Suppose the manager of a museum wants to make sure that at all times every point of the museum is watched by a guard. The guards are stationed at fixed posts, but they are able to turn around. How many guards are needed? We will see how a single clever idea can take this possibly difficult problem and make it easy. We will also give an introduction to "mathematical induction," which will help us turn the clever idea into an elegant proof.

2002

1. Properties of the Group of Symplectic Matrices
PME Student Presenter, Mathfest 2003
MAA Student Presenter, Illinois MAA Conference - Jacksonville, IL, Spring 2002
This presentation was the culmination of a semester of undergraduate research under the direction of Prof. Thomas Bengtson at Augustana College. The research was done as part of the Earl Beling Scholars program at Augustana.
2. The Illustrated Analyst
MAA Student Presenter, Mathfest 2002
The Illustrated Analyst was a project I completed while participating in the VIGRE REU in Geometric Visualization at the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign in the summer of 2002. The program was directed by Prof. George Francis and my mentor was Prof. Karen Shuman. The Illustrated Analyst is a piece of software that provides 3-dimensional, graphical information on a variety of functions, Fourier transforms and convolutions.