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The Mathematicians of Color Alliance

Michael Young

Where are all the Black mathematicians? Why do so few Black math majors go on to graduate school? And when they do, why do so many of them drop out before they finish? In an era when equity and access are on the minds of many people, these are the kinds of questions that mathematicians need to ask.

In 2016, nearly 1000 mathematical science PhDs were awarded to US citizens. Yet only 29 went to Black mathematicians. In a country where 13.4% of the population is Black, only 3% of math PhDs go to Black people. Clearly there is room for improvement in the profession.

In 2012, only two people of color (both women) were in the Iowa State University Mathematics PhD program working on passing the required qualifying exams. Both were struggling and uncertain about how to go about getting help. Their challenges led to the creation of the Mathematicians of Color Alliance (MOCA), an organization at Iowa State University founded to give people of color the community a person needs to succeed in mathematics.

Most of our members are not only the first in their families to pursue an advanced degree, but they are also the first to earn a college degree. Even if their families support their decisions, their parents and other family members often do not know how to help their students navigate the administrative aspects of higher education. Students who don’t know the steps involved in earning an advanced degree may feel like they don’t belong. Mathematics should be accessible to everyone. We strive to provide support so that the students who are willing to put in the work can enjoy the fruits of their labors.

Since it began, the group has grown and the purpose has shifted to do more than provide support for those trying to gain access to and find success in an advanced degree program. Today, we work toward offering a more complete support system from recruitment through graduation and beyond.

Identifying a Need

Shanise, a Georgia native then working on passing her qualifying exams at Iowa State, would become one of the original MOCA members back in August of 2012. She was still new to the entire system and was trying to figure things out as she went. As a Black student in a state where less than four percent of the population is Black, she already felt a bit isolated. There were many things that she had to get accustomed to, and sometimes she felt like Iowa State was the wrong place for her to continue her education.

Scarlitte, a current MOCA member who grew up in the diverse and agricultural community of Salinas, California, also faced challenges. While her family was incredibly supportive of her choice to pursue a graduate degree in mathematics, they did not entirely understand it. When she was accepted and preparing to leave for Iowa State, she told them how long it would take to get her degree, and to this day, they still ask when she will come home.

Many MOCA members have discussed feeling isolated from their White peers at graduate school, in part because of differing family backgrounds. Many Black students also report feeling that they do not belong in graduate school. For Mike, a MOCA graduate who grew up in South Chicago, there was always a feeling of being an “impostor,” as though he couldn’t possibly earn a master’s degree, let alone a doctorate. When Mike found himself sitting in his first class as a graduate student, he was nearly certain that it was a fluke and that he did not belong because there was no way he was smart enough to be working toward a graduate degree.

For students whose parents and family members don’t have experience with higher education, navigating graduate school can seem daunting. This means that students have to look elsewhere for support. For Black students, the lack of Black peers can make it difficult to relate to the people around them. MOCA helps students find a supportive community.

A Brief History of MOCA

Iowa State is actively seeking to advance underrepresented students, so we have created a fellowship to help draw in a more diverse group of students from around the country. We do a lot to help set up graduate students for success, including a stipend and tuition assistance. However, there are many other types of support that students need. They need mentorship and guidance to navigate a system that is accustomed to a different kind of student. While Iowa State could help provide the financial assistance to ensure that students could work toward their degrees without the distraction of being in financial peril, MOCA could provide other kinds of support that Black students needed to be successful.

For many people of color coming from the East or West Coasts, Iowa can be quite a culture shock. Though the people in the mathematics department were always incredibly responsive and supportive, dealing with the wider community could be difficult. Mike, the South Chicago native, found the lack of diversity and the kinds of activities available in a more rural area a bit difficult to get accustomed to. And for Scarlitte, though she came from a community primarily based on agriculture, arriving in Iowa came as a shock. In Salinas, different races work together, and she thought that was how most communities functioned. When she moved to Iowa State in the fall of 2016 to work on her graduate degree, she quickly noticed that, instead of the migrants and other people out working the fields, machines managed most of the work in the fields.

In 2012, I approached the director of diversity and chair of the department to request support to create a community for these students. I knew that on their own these students would not likely seek others who could understand their background. By starting a community for Black students to come together and talk, I knew that they would start to open up, feel like they belong, and would be able to help each other when they had similar problems. These students faced challenges that no one else would be able to help them with, such as finding a place where women could have their hair done. Mundane tasks that were easy to resolve back home were suddenly more of a problem because the community simply wasn’t built with typical Black students’ lives in mind.

In 2013, we had three more Black women join the PhD program in mathematics. We discussed the good experiences because it helps reinforce the idea that they do belong and that there are always good things to consider. Of course, we also discussed the problematic aspects, particularly about race.

The Four Areas of Support

MOCA mainly provides four types of support: recruitment, personal, mentoring, and post-graduation. Mentoring in all of these areas helps students feel like they belong at Iowa State.

Recruitment

When I arrived at Iowa State, the initiative to attract underrepresented students had only gained interest from a couple of students. Today, MOCA not only helps recruit Black students to enter the program, but also helps retain them. So far six of our members have either finished or are finishing their PhDs. This success has made it easier to reach out to other Black students around the country and recruit them to the university. As potential graduate students come to check out the program, we invite them to visit with our group for an evening of conversation. They discuss what it is like forming such a small percentage of the population and the unique challenges that they will face, particularly the culture shock.

MOCA has been fortunate in that the people who join the group are incredibly supportive of each other. This is easily seen during the recruitment process. Often, students just need a bit of a push to make that final decision. We want potential students to see the benefits Iowa State has to offer as well as let them know we understand the problems they may face. By visiting with MOCA, prospective students can see that they will have others who understand what it will be like and can offer a protective layer that would otherwise be absent so far from home.

We also provide assistance in understanding the financial aspects of working towards an advanced degree. Many graduate students are new to handling their own finances, and for minority students, discussing personal finances can be viewed as taboo. With many of our members uncertain and uncomfortable about how to obtain necessary financial aid, we know that this is a key component of not only recruiting but also retaining members.

Sometimes what prospective students need is to feel supported while they are preparing for their qualifying exams. There is currently a post-baccalaureate program to help them take a year to fully prepare so that they don’t feel rushed through the process. Feeling prepared for the exams increases the likelihood that they will pass, and it proves that they are more than good enough to join the program.

Personal support

Personal support is essential, no matter who the student is. With some students arriving without familial support, the situation can make them feel like they don’t belong. MOCA members support each other—if they encounter academic problems, there will be people who can help them through it. Building these relationships as soon as students arrive in the department is important because scheduling meetings becomes more problematic as the semester progresses. Once the friendships have formed, sometimes all it takes is a meeting or two of quietly working side by side to get students to feel like this is where they belong. These relationships now extend beyond graduation as previous members still feel comfortable calling and asking for advice.

Personal support also works as the best way of retaining our students. It is much easier to get discouraged when you feel like you are alone, which increases the odds that a student will drop out of the program. We have been successful in our retention in large part because MOCA members feel they have a strong, reliable group of personal support from people who are like their own personal cheerleaders.

Mentoring

Mentoring is the most enjoyable aspect of working with students. It is also tricky because there are so many components to it. My favorite aspect of mentoring is taking the graduate students to conferences and professional development seminars. These experiences provide encouragement and motivation, particularly when students are struggling because they can see just how much they have to gain by persevering. For those who aren’t quite sure what direction to go, I help them understand their options and set goals. I always encourage them to set their own personal goals because, in the long run, it always benefits the student to have a gauge that they set and measure themselves by instead of simply accepting what others say about them.

We also rely heavily on peer and group mentoring. A person who has been through the process can provide a more focused approach for those just starting out. While administrators are there to help, many of them do not have the same personal background and have not faced the same kinds of problems. Our mentors fill the gap, helping those just starting out to better manage their time and letting them know that there is someone else who can understand what they’re going through.

Post-graduation

MOCA graduates have been a great source of assistance to our current students, and so far they have not required much assistance themselves. Given how in-demand mathematicians are, our graduates quickly learn that they have a lot of options once they finish their advanced degrees. Finding employment does not appear to be a problem—they have been able to find positions that they enjoy within months of finishing their degree programs. By seeing others succeed, more people of color will begin to recognize that earning an advanced degree in math is a real possibility.

A Personal Look at the Effects of MOCA

While the retention of students has been phenomenal, it is the way our students feel about MOCA that really matters.

One of the founding members and first MOCA graduates

Shanise was one of the first Black students from Iowa State to complete a graduate degree in mathematics. Although she came from Georgia, the culture shock was mitigated by the fact that she knew it wasn’t a permanent move. Knowing that her time at Iowa State was finite and that she had a strong support group there made it easier for her to buckle down and graduate.

Figure 1.

Michael Dairyko, Shanise Walker, and Chassidy Bozeman at Iowa State University’s 2018 graduation.

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The biggest problem for Shanise was that she did not feel that her research skills were at a level where she could achieve success. MOCA provided her with the encouragement she needed to not only improve her research skills, but also to foster the confidence to keep going. She explained that in the early days she wasn’t sure how to budget her time when she was conducting research because there were so many other things that needed to be done. Learning how to carve out time to conduct meaningful research was difficult, but it has been a skill that she has mastered. Now she is able to put those skills to work in an entirely different environment.

It took her six years to earn her degree, and she remembers the time at Iowa State with a lot of fondness and humor. Looking back, that first year was the hardest because it was so difficult to connect to other students. After the founding of MOCA, things became a lot easier. Today, she occasionally takes calls from students looking for a little insight into the program or who need some advice on things to do in the area. She found a fantastic job at the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire, about ninety minutes away from Minneapolis, a turn of events she never would have imagined in those early days. When she travels, she actively encourages prospective students to consider Iowa State.

A successful graduate

Mike initially had no intention of going for an advanced degree in mathematics because he didn’t think that he was smart enough to do it. Having earned his undergraduate degree at Pomona College in Claremont, California, Mike was ready to start looking for a suitable position. Then he met Michael. Michael convinced Mike to just check things out and see if there was a school where he would be interested in working on a graduate degree. Mike visited two different schools, but after he visited Iowa State, he knew that was where he wanted to go if he was going to pursue another degree.

One of Mike’s biggest problems was his self-described Impostor Syndrome. He just never felt like he belonged. Then he talked to the other members of MOCA, and found that two of them felt exactly the same way. Other students began to say that they felt that way too, but that it was a matter of ignoring that doubt and working through those first few weeks to see that they were there because they had earned it.

Some of his fondest memories are of the meetings and potluck meals the group had. While the study sessions were fantastic, it was nice to have the socialization of the meals to really help them talk about things. They could discuss their problems and experiences. Their conversations validated some of the things he felt and helped him be more open. He was an active member of the water polo team during his time at Iowa State, so he felt like he constantly had people cheering him on in many different areas of his life.

Today, he works with the Milwaukee Brewers, a position that he accepted less than two months after earning his doctorate. His time at Iowa State taught him that he is not only good enough and smart enough, but also that he can dream in ways that go much further than he had originally imagined.

The unique experience for a current member

Scarlitte first had a taste of what it would be like to go to Iowa State in 2015 when she attended the Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program. She knew that the people in the mathematics department were welcoming, and that she would stand out a bit as Mexican, but this did not seem like a reason to ignore the great experience she had during her REU. It just meant doing a bit of adjusting to the entirely different community dynamic.

When Scarlitte joined MOCA, that made her experience that much more enjoyable. One of the things that she has found to be most beneficial is having the chance to see other people of color in the field. She has been able to attend conferences and lectures where people of color have served as primary speakers, reinforcing the idea that she is in the right place—that she belongs. She wishes MOCA had more regularly scheduled meetings. However, that is always a delicate balancing act because each graduate student has his or her own unique research and schedules that make this a challenging task. Still, she loves spending time with other MOCA members because she loves to see how others in similar positions are doing and know that she is not alone.

Concluding thoughts

Trying to go at it alone in the field of mathematics is like trying to learn a language without ever speaking to another person in that language. Everything is more challenging. Yet this is the situation that most minorities face, not only when they work towards their bachelor’s degree, but also when they strive for a master’s degree or a PhD. I think that what makes it all the more difficult is that students may not even realize that it is a problem because they have been desensitized to it. Being a part of a community creates a feeling of belonging. However, it is unreasonable for us to expect graduate students to create this collective when they arrive on campus to study mathematics. The onus is on us, mathematics faculty, directors, program coordinators, and leadership, to do what is required to give each student the opportunity to be successful.

Since the publication of the book in 2021, there have been notable changes in the professional trajectories of the individuals mentioned. All have transitioned to new institutions and assumed different roles that reflect their evolving expertise and aspirations.

Michael Young has joined the Mathematical Sciences faculty of Carnegie Mellon University, where he serves as the inaugural associate dean for diversity, equity and inclusion in the Mellon College of Science. He also leads the ASCEND Mentor Network and is the creator and executive producer of the podcast Mathematically Uncensored.

In 2022, Shanise relocated to her home state of Georgia, where she is an assistant professor of mathematics at Clark Atlanta University. Shanise continues to be active in research, mentoring, and in the mathematics community. She recently coedited the book Aspiring and Inspiring: Tenure and Leadership in Academic Mathematics.

After graduating from Iowa State, Mike started his career in business intelligence for professional sports. He currently is the director of advanced analytics for the Milwaukee Bucks.

Credits

Figure 1 is courtesy of Michael Dairyko.

Photo of Michael Young is courtesy of CMU/Jonah Bayer.