ISU’s Math Department wins highest national program award from American Mathematical Society

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Participants at the most recent ISU Mathematics Research Experiences for Undergraduates program held in 2013. The next REU is this summer.

The Department of Mathematics at Iowa State University is the 2015 recipient of the AMS Award for an Exemplary Program or Achievement in a Mathematics Department, the highest honor awarded by the American Mathematical Society to a math department in North America.

The AMS cited ISU’s math department for excellence in several areas including undergraduate education, diversity efforts, mentoring and teamwork. A $5,000 cash prize is included in the award.

“What pleases me the most about the award is the acknowledgement that it is an all-around award, for excellence across the board,” Cliff Bergman, professor and chair of mathematics, said. "Research, teaching, diversity, the grad program. We are truly a full-service department."

Aloysius Helminck of North Carolina State University, who served as chair of the award selection committee, said, “The Department of Mathematics at Iowa State University has managed to do it all. The department delivers outstanding instruction in its courses, provides a supportive community for its math majors, mentors well its graduate students, and runs a highly successful Research Experiences for Undergraduates program. What is more, they have made recruiting and nurturing of women and minority graduate students a departmental priority. The department is highly deserving of this prestigious award.”

Mathematics is an academic unit in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

The AMS was founded in 1888 to further mathematical research and scholarship and has a membership of nearly 30,000 individuals and 580 institutions in the U.S. and around the world.

NEWS RELEASE College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Iowa State University

Contacts: Clifford Bergman, Mathematics, (515) 294-1752 (cbergman@iastate.edu) Jess Guess, Liberal Arts and Sciences Communications, 515-294-9906, (jguess@iastate.edu)