NCUWM: Inspiring Women for Generations

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03/07/2019 Added

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When the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Department of Mathematics was recognized with the Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Math, and Engineering Mentoring in 1998, the award came with a $10,000 grant from the National Science Foundation. That grant led to additional support from the University to hold the first Nebraska Conference for Undergraduate Women in Mathematics in 1999. Since then, NSF has funded NCUWM four times, covering more than two decades and making an impact upon more than 4,000 attendees. NCUWM encourages and mentors undergraduate women to pursue graduate study in mathematics, seek mathematical careers, and present their original research to their peers.

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[00:00:02.837]During the 1990s
[00:00:04.043]the Department of Mathematics at UNL
[00:00:05.920]had done a lot of work in improving its program
[00:00:09.213]especially with regard to female graduate students
[00:00:12.229]and became a national model.
[00:00:14.315]That led to the department being recognized
[00:00:16.967]with the Presidential Award for Excellence in
[00:00:19.559]Science, Math, and Engineering Mentoring in 1998.
[00:00:22.443]That award came with a $10,000 grant
[00:00:25.894]from the National Science Foundation and we were able
[00:00:28.266]to use that grant to leverage additional support
[00:00:31.662]from the University to hold our first conference.
[00:00:35.819]The mission of NCUWM is to encourage women
[00:00:38.616]to go on in graduate studies in math or a related field
[00:00:41.905]or even just a mathematical career
[00:00:44.204]but also to give them the tools
[00:00:46.484]so that they can be successful if they do so.
[00:00:49.317]When we first started the conference, a lot of women
[00:00:52.313]just did not see graduate school as a possibility.
[00:00:54.593]And opening their eyes to the idea that
[00:00:58.633]there were lots of women doing mathematics
[00:01:00.613]and that graduate school was indeed
[00:01:03.427]a real possibility for them
[00:01:05.085]was a pretty powerful experience.
[00:01:08.088]The mathematics at NCUWM—
[00:01:09.925]we have presentations by the plenaries
[00:01:12.120]but we also have a large number of student presentations on their research.
[00:01:16.764]And this can be research that they've done
[00:01:18.479]in an REU or with a faculty member on
[00:01:21.300]topics such as graph theory or statistics
[00:01:24.720]or even the mathematics of gerrymandering.
[00:01:27.258]One of the things that continuously impresses me
[00:01:30.065]is the caliber of the student presentations at this conference
[00:01:33.259]and how the undergrads themselves
[00:01:35.101]serve as role models to their own peers.
[00:01:38.715]When we started this conference
[00:01:40.485]it was one of the first conferences focused on
[00:01:42.831]undergraduate research and specifically designed
[00:01:45.761]for undergraduates in mathematics in the country.
[00:01:48.905]I think there were about 50 participants in the first conference
[00:01:51.578]and a third of those participants gave talks.
[00:01:53.804]The conference has now grown to about
[00:01:56.613]250 undergraduate participants a year
[00:01:58.857]and about half are now presenting their own research during the conference
[00:02:03.186]either in talks or in poster presentations.
[00:02:07.561]In choosing plenaries, we have two or three a year
[00:02:10.383]and we usually like to have them representing mathematics in industry
[00:02:15.274]as well as academia
[00:02:16.945]and so we look for people who are not only pioneers in their fields
[00:02:20.649]but we also look for women who have a history of
[00:02:23.544]mentoring other women or underrepresented minorities in STEM
[00:02:27.963]and/or who have made contributions to mathematical education.
[00:02:31.758]Our hope is that among our plenaries and panelists
[00:02:35.206]each undergrad can see one role model and say
[00:02:38.789]"Hey, I'm like that person and if they could do it, I can do it too."
[00:02:43.184]We tell the participants every year to look around
[00:02:45.868]because if they choose to stay in mathematics
[00:02:48.562]the people in that room with them at the conference
[00:02:51.760]will be their colleagues for the rest of their lives.

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NCUWM: Inspiring Women for Generations

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