Colloquium Series

The Mathematics and Computer Science Colloquium Series fills an important role in our educational mission. Our departmental colloquium series brings students, faculty, and experts together where they can directly interact socially and intellectually. Specifically, it provides students with the opportunity to grow intellectually through exposure to concepts, ideas, and research areas that exist beyond the traditional classroom setting. This follows the long-standing tradition in the sciences of gathering interested people together for the open exchange of ideas, presentation of new results, and positing of intriguing questions.

Another important mission of our department is to prepare students in mathematics and computer science for meaningful careers. The colloquium series serves as a forum for professionals who have backgrounds in mathematics and/or computer science to visit Albion's students and discuss the wide variety of career options that await them once they graduate. These talks are of both academic and inspirational value to our current students. Indeed, they provide current mathematics and computer science majors with tangible examples of what they can achieve after graduating from Albion College.

• 2012-13 Colloquium Schedule
  
  
• Information for Speakers
  • Audience
    • The target audience is undergraduate students with majors in mathematics and computer science. Faculty from mathematics, computer science, and other disciplines freqently attend. Students are required to have first semester calculus and computer science, but most will have additional experience. We expect between 10 and 30 people to attend, including faculty. Consider preparing a handout for complicated reference material such as terminology, source code, graphs, and assumed facts, axioms, or theorems.
• Title and Abstract
  • Please supply us with a title and a brief (less than 250 words) abstract to help us advertise your talk. You can see titles and abstracts of other talks to get some ideas of what has been presented. The schedules from the following years are available:
    • 2011-12 Colloquium Schedule
    • 2010-11 Colloquium Schedule
    • 2009-10 Colloquium Schedule
    • 2008-09 Colloquium Schedule
    • 2007-08 Colloquium Schedule
    • 2006-07 Colloquium Schedule
    • 2005-06 Colloquium Schedule
    • 2004-05 Colloquium Schedule
• Format
  • Ideally, talks will be 40 to 45 minutes, allowing 5-10 minutes for discussion. Mathematician Paul Halmos suggested presenting a general introduction and motivation, followed by technical background material, and finishing with a selection of remarkable, beautiful, intruiging points (Notices of the American Mathematical Society, vol. 21, 1974, pp 155-158).
• Biography
  • To help provide a proper introduction to the audience, please provide a simple biography including your current affiliation, places of degrees, and areas of expertise. Consider sharing personal interests such as hobbies or some unique characteristics. We try to have students introduce our speakers, giving them some additional public speaking experience and some additional incentive to engage in the talks. A student might contact you about biographical information or additional details about your talk.
• Audiovisual Equipment
  • Please supply us with a list of resources you will require during your talk. Our colloquium room has chalkboards. It also has a projection system (up to 1280x1024 resolution) with a computer, VCR, DVD, and overhead projector. The projection system has integrated audio. A combination wireless mouse and laser pointer is available for the console computer. A wireless keyboard is also available if you choose to have audience members participate in typing. This system can also accomodate your own computer, including audio. Let us know if you need to need a 35 mm slide projector, a document camera, or other special AV needs.
• Resource List
  • Please consider providing students with a few resources related to your talk. Students are required to write a short paper on one of the talks. Your resource list can be a starting point for the students.
• Further Explorations
  • Please consider providing a some additional explorations suitable for undergraduate students. These might range from simple homework problems to challenging unsolved problems.
• Maps and Directions
  • The Mathematics and Computer Science department is located in the Albion College Science Complex. The street address of the Science Complex is 908 E. Michigan Avenue. Free and convenient parking is available on Michigan Avenue or one of the nearby side streets. See the campus map (#37) or Google Maps. Albion College will reimburse speakers for their round-trip mileage at the IRS Mileage Rate of $0.555 per mile (as of 2011). Our accounting office needs a Google direction map printout or equivalent for their documentation.
• Dinner
  • Schedules permitting, we also enjoy hosting an early dinner with the speaker and a small group of Albion faculty and students. This is typically ad hoc.
• Additional Information about Careers and Graduate Programs
  • Consider providing stduents with information on your institution. For academics, this may include information about graduate programs and research opportunities. Speakers working in the business world, information about internships and careers would be appropriate.