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Mathematics at the 2002 SACNAS Meeting

The Society for Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) held its 2002 National Conference and K-12 Teacher Workshops in Anaheim, California, September 26-29. The conference theme was Community: A Catalyst for Science, and the meeting drew a record number of participants---over 2,300. The program included keynote and conference speakers, awards, student poster presentations, and social events. The American Mathematical Society was among the Conference session sponsors and was one of many exhibitors including 81 colleges and universities, 15 societies and associations, 12 other educational institutions, and 37 government agencies that provided information about educational programs and career opportunities in the sciences. The AMS exhibit drew K-12 science teachers, undergraduate and graduate students, Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) organizers and faculty.

AMS exhibit at SACNAS 2002 In the AMS booth

Jim Maxwell, AMS Director of Professional Programs, Membership and Meetings, was on hand to answer questions related to REU and graduate programs, career opportunities in mathematics, and resources for mathematics educators and professionals. He also participated as a panel member at a session on 'The Critical Role of Summer Research Experiences for Students' with Maria Elena Zavala (SACNAS President and Program Director of MARC/MBRS), Peter Kim (Outreach Coordinator, Environmental Careers Association), and Levon Parker (Director, Summer Program in the Neurological Sciences, NIH). Many students from the SIMU REU, University of Puerto Rico, Humacao, participated in this annual SACNAS conference.

The AMS provided the following materials for students, teachers and researchers:

Speakers at the conference included the following professionals in various fields of mathematics, statistics and biostatistics:

Rodrigo Bañuelos, mathematics department, Purdue University
Anna E. Barón, department of preventive medicine and biometrics, School of Medicine, University of Colorado Health Sciences Center
Carlos Castillo-Chavez, departments of biological statistics and computational biology, statistics and theoretical and applied mechanics, Cornell University
José Franco, EQUALS Program, Lawrence Hall of Science, University of California at Berkeley
Michael A. Garcia, science, mathematics and physics educator, Project SPACE
Rudy Guerra, Biostatistics Center, Southern Methodist University
Christopher Kribs-Zaleta, mathematics and teacher education, University of Texas, Arlington
Herbert Medina, mathematics department, Loyola Marymount University
Javier Rojo, statistics department, UTEP
William Yslas Velez, mathematics department, University of Arizona
Joseph Watkins, NSF Biocomplexity Initiative and science/math coordinator, Native American Summer Institute
Ricardo Cortez, mathematics department, Tulane University, an active SACNAS mathematics session organizer, was unable to attend this meeting due to transportation problems from hurricane Isidore.

Other mathematicians attended this conference, and many other speakers represented the fields of physics, chemistry, biology, medicine, geology, astronomy, education, outreach, and interdisciplinary research in academic and non-academic settings.

Brandilyn Stigler and Reinhard Laubenbacher, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, presented A Discrete Approach for Modeling Biochemical Networks as part of the graduate oral presentation program.

Student Posters on mathematics were presented in the exhibit hall on Friday afternoon and Saturday morning.

AMS members who would like to become involved in or who wish to find out more about SACNAS are invited to visit www.sacnas.org.

Visit the AMS Careers and Education web pages or email prof-serv@ams.org for more information on graduate studies in mathematics.

See also the report on Mathematics at the 2001 SACNAS Meeting.