About the Rose Mathematics Department

The Rose Mathematics Department is dedicated to providing an excellent educational environment for its students and providing an engaging mathematical environment for faculty and students. Thus we provide:

• a strong program in foundational mathematics for all Rose-Hulman students in calculus, differential equations and probability/statistics,
• a rich upper division program for majors, double majors and minors providing preparation for careers in industry or graduate school,
• active programs of faculty and undergraduate research including seminars, conferences, and a journal for undergraduate mathematics, and
• an active program of mathematics competitions.

These are all supported by:

• excellent facilities supporting classroom teaching, and
• computational facilities to support teaching and research.

You may learn about our teaching program by checking out our program and course descriptions throughout this site and looking over some of the faculty course webpages linked to from our course information page. The facilities supporting this are described on our facilities page. Additional details about Rose-Hulman and the Mathematics Department may be found on the fact sheet.

The rest of this page describes some of the features of the Rose-Hulman Mathematics Department which we think makes it strong.

Advanced Placement and Fast Track Calculus

Rose-Hulman has an aggressive program of advanced placement through national recognized advanced placement courses and exams, college transfer credit, and our Fast Track Calculus program. Indeed almost fifty percent of incoming freshmen get advanced placement credit for at least one calculus course. and about twenty five percent get credit for two or more. Each year ten percent or more of freshman get credit for an entire year of mathematics (3 courses) by taking advantage of our Fast Track Calculus program. With so many students with advanced placement we are able to offer all our first two years of math courses in every quarter, allowing students start at the right level of math and continue with their math studies uninterrupted until all requirements are completed. The AP credit so gained allows a student to get a greater educational value by taking a greater variety of advanced courses, taking a double major or minor, or participating in an academic year internship or study abroad, and still graduate on time. For more details on these programs see our AP web page or the Fast Track Calculus website.

Research and Seminars

All members of the department carry out research and other service activities that improve the "mathematical atmosphere" at Rose-Hulman and beyond. The research interests and activities are summarized on our research and publications overview page, as well as individual faculty pages. Of particular note is our seminar. The Rose-Hulman Mathematics Seminar meets on a regular basis throughout the year, with Rose faculty, students and faculty from other institutions. Topics can vary from week to week. Anyone -- student or faculty -- is encouraged to give a talk or series of talks on any topic of interest. The seminar is quite informal. We're especially happy to have students attend or better yet, give talks! To help encourage this a student may enroll in a one hour a week seminar course in which they attend and report on 9 talks and make one presentation to the department on mathematical work.

Supporting Undergraduate Mathematics Research

Rose-Hulman is very actively involved in undergraduate mathematics research both with Rose-Hulman students and beyond, because in the end we believe it provides a richer educational environment for our students and faculty. We encourage our students to present their work in the Rose Math Seminar and at conferences. Here is a page of student papers and presentations. In addition to encouraging students to engage in research and present their work in the seminar and at conferences, we have three formal outreach activities that help us create this environment. Let us describe them.

Rose-Hulman Conference on Undergraduate Mathematics: The goal of this conference is to spotlight and celebrate the accomplishments and work of undergraduate mathematicians. We typically invite 3 talks from professional mathematicians, but all other talks are contributed by undergraduate students on mathematical topics. Appropriate material for contributed talks runs the gamut from challenging class projects to expository talks on interesting mathematical topics to work done with a faculty member or research done in an REU. The conference is put on every spring, for further details see the conference web page.

Rose-Hulman NSF-REU site: Our NSF_REU site, which is part of the system of NSF-REU sites, has been in operation for 15 years and has given over 100 students of high national caliber a chance to engage in formal research in a focused and supportive manner. It has been very helpful for the Rose faculty member participants in their research programs and has a positive impact on what we do in our upper division mathematics program.

Rose-Hulman Undergraduate Mathematics Journal: The journal is our latest effort in the realm of supporting undergraduate research. The journal is devoted entirely to papers written by undergraduates on topics related to mathematics. In order to maintain a high level of exposition, each paper must be sponsored by a mathematician familiar with the student's work and each paper is refereed. The journal is distributed freely in an electronic format (PDF) from the journal's web site.

Student Mathematics Activities

Mathematics Competitions: Our students show a great deal of interest in collegiate level mathematics competitions a passion which is shared by a large number of our department faculty. The department sponsors and encourages student participation in a large number of these mathematics competitions. Rose students have always faired well in these competitions and it is very gratifying to see 20-40 students participate in these activities each year, even though many of them are not math majors. The department has a one hour a week problem solving seminar for students interested in competition style problem solving. The department is also actively involved in a number of high school contests including our own annual RHIT High School Contest, and administrative support in Indiana for MATHCOUNTS and the American Mathematics Competitions. For additional information see our competitions page and our news and events page.

Student Clubs: There are several student clubs on campus that either have a mathematical focus or have served as avenues for applying the mathematical and science skills. Pi Mu Epsilon is an honorary mathematics fraternity on campus with well over 30 members. The club is an active participant in many of the Mathematics department functions such as the Alfred R. Schmidt Freshman Competition, the Rose-Hulman High School Mathematics Contest, and the Undergraduate Mathematics Conference. It also participates in department activities. Many students attend the Rose Math Seminar. Finally, two student (technical) clubs that have been popular with math majors are the Aerial Robotics Club and the Solar Phantom Club.