5 Organization and Management Plan

Coordinating Committee. The organization and management of the project rests with the VIGRE Coordinating Committee. This committee consists of seven faculty, one staff, and two VIGRE participants:

• Peter March (PI and Department Chair)
• Vitaly Bergelson, Henri Moscovici, Björn Sandstede, Daniel Shapiro, Warren Sinnott (Co-PIs)
• Yung-Chen Lu (Vice Chair for Graduate Studies)
• Cindy Bernlohr (TA Support staff)
• VIGRE graduate trainee representative
• VIGRE postdoctoral fellow representative.

Peter March will chair the committee and will initially appoint the graduate and postdoc representatives. Thus, the broad research interests of the faculty are represented on the Coordinating Committee as is the departmental administration and staff.

Faculty on the Coordinating Committee have overall responsibility for the primary components of the project:

Peter March

(Department Chair)

• Recruitment, retention, advising, and mentoring of VIGRE postdocs
• Pipeline Program: Overcoming the Barriers to Entry to Graduate Work
• Project performance evaluation

Vitaly Bergelson

Pipeline Programs:

• Recruitment and retention of VIGRE undergraduate trainees
• Undergraduate Research Experience

Yung-Chen Lu

(Vice Chair for Graduate Studies)
Recruitment, retention, advising, and mentoring of VIGRE graduate trainees

Henri Moscovici

Invitation to Research

Björn Sandstede

Professional Development

Daniel Shapiro

(Vice Chair for Lower Division Studies)
Pipeline Programs:

• National Undergraduate Research Conference
• Ross Program Teacher Component

Warren Sinnott

Working Group Rotations

Cindy Bernlohr's role is to advise the committee on graduate teaching issues. The graduate and postdoc representatives' role is to provide input to the committee from VIGRE project participants.

Organization. Next we describe some of the organizational details specific to each of the primary components. It is understood that while the Coordinating Committee members have management responsibility for particular components and may, in fact, carry out some of these tasks, some tasks will be delegated to other faculty. Peter March is Department Chair, PI of the VIGRE Project, and Chair of the VIGRE Coordinating Committee. He will ensure that as the primary components come online and are made to articulate with one another, appropriate faculty will undertake appropriately delegated tasks.

Invitation to Research:

• solicit and encourage faculty and postdocs to prepare modules and lecture notes
• coordinate the schedule of lectures
• ensure appropriate rotation of lectures through the five main research areas mentioned in section 2.3
• work with lecturers to ensure that their talks are delivered at a pace and level suitable to the aims of the series and the background of the intended audience.

Working Group Rotations:

• solicit and encourage faculty and postdocs to form Working Groups
• facilitate the quarterly matching of graduate students and Working Groups
• serve as editor in chief of the VIGRE Working Group Journal
• coordinate with representatives of Working Groups to ensure they meet regularly and provide appropriate student projects
• coordinate with representatives of Working Groups to ensure that student presentations and reports are completed in a timely fashion.

Advising, Mentoring, Recruitment, and Retention:

• our advising, mentoring, recruitment and retention activities and responsibilities, and their implementation, have been outlined in previous sections:
  • see section 4 for recruitment and retention
  • see section 2.5 for advising and mentoring of undergraduate students, graduate students, and postdocs
• personnel involved in and responsible for advising and mentoring:
  • the Graduate Advising Committee currently consists of Gregory Baker, Timothy Carlson, Andrzej Derdzinski, Neil Falkner, Zbigniew Fiedorowicz, David Goss, and John Hsia
  • the designated Coordinating Committee members (Peter March, Vitaly Bergelson, Yung-Chen Lu) will consult regularly with faculty mentors to ensure that sufficient contact between mentors and VIGRE participants (graduate trainees and postdoctoral fellows) is maintained.

Professional Development:

• Introduction to Teaching:
  • Two faculty members, Phil Huneke and Yung-Chen Lu, and one staff member, Cindy Bernlohr, currently coordinate this activity
• Computer Literacy:
  • Ed Overman has agreed to teach this course in Summer Quarter 2002
• Communicating Mathematics:
  • Björn Sandstede has agreed to develop this course
• Industrial Mathematics:
  • Ed Overman has agreed to begin development of the Industrial Mathematics Seminar.
    Yung-Chen Lu (Vice Chair of Graduate Studies) will coordinate MITACS applications (cf. section 2.6.4).

Pipeline Programs:

• Undergraduate Research Experience
  • coordinate recruitment of VIGRE undergraduate trainees
  • coordinate matching of undergraduates with the Ross Program or a Working Group
• National Undergraduate Research Conference
  • initiate and maintain contacts with national summer mathematics programs, REU sites, appropriate faculty at VIGRE sites, and national professional associations including AWM, MAA, NAM.
  • organize local arrangements, advertising, and scheduling
• Overcoming Barriers to Entry to Graduate Work
  • coordinate with Vice Chair for Graduate Studies, Graduate Recruitment Committee and Graduate Advising Committee to identify beginning students who will benefit from this support mechanism
  • John Hsia and Peter March have agreed to develop the seminar.

Commitment. The primary components of this proposal have the widespread support of the faculty.

Sixteen senior faculty have already volunteered to deliver Invitation to Research modules in one of the five main research areas. Even before soliciting the involvement of junior faculty and postdocs, there are enough modules for a complete year.

There are already ten proposed Working Groups involving 27 faculty (20 Professors, 4 Associate Professors, 3 Assistant Professors) and four postdocs (three Ross and one Zassenhaus Assistant Professor). We anticipate that in equilibrium there will be 6 VIGRE graduate trainees, 4 students on university fellowships, perhaps 10 regularly supported TAs and 10 VIGRE undergraduate trainees involved in Working Group Rotations. Using these figures, there is on average two graduate students and one undergraduate student per Working Group per quarter. Thus even before soliciting Working Groups from among the junior faculty and postdocs, there is enough capacity in these Working Groups to accommodate the demands of the program.

In all 33 professors, comprising nearly one half the faculty, are committed to Invitation to Research modules and Working Group Rotations. We expect this number to rise as the primary components of the project come online.