By Mr A Wilkinson
As a teacher I’m totally confident standing up in front of a group of pupils of any size and explaining various aspects of Mathematics. I had a really enjoyable, but certainly more nerve-wracking experience on Monday, 25 November when I had the opportunity to explain some rather more complex mathematics to a room full of professional mathematicians.
The occasion was the American Physical Society – Division of Fluid Dynamics annual conference in Salt Lake City, Utah. The opportunity came about as a result of the part-time Ph.D. in Fluid Dynamics that I’ve been progressing through the Open University for the past two years. This mostly involves me working on problems in Fluid Dynamics that haven’t been tackled before and writing the results up in a paper that’s then submitted to an academic journal, peer reviewed, and, after addressing reviewers’ comments, finally published. So far I have two published papers. Since maths conferences are a great way of advertising one’s work, and the one I’ve just been to, with 4000 attendees, maximises the audience, I applied to make a presentation there.
I was lucky to be accepted, and with funding from the Open University and a grant from The Institute of Mathematics and its Applications (another application process), I was able to take up the offer.
The event ran from Sunday 24th to Tuesday 26th November, which, although in school term time fortunately fit with my part time days teaching at Kimbolton (just!).
The days were long, with presentations, awards, keynote speeches and a variety of informal gatherings from 8 till 8 on the first two days then 8 till 3 on the Tuesday. It was certainly intense, but I saw a lot of interesting mathematics and met and made contact with mathematicians from around the world who work in similar areas to me.
Happily, my presentation went well too, despite a rather croaky voice which had mostly recovered from two days earlier when I’d woken up with pretty well no voice at all and even briefly wondered if I was going to be able to travel.
Alongside all of this I managed to fit in a quick walking tour of downtown to see the main sites. Salt Lake City is a very picturesque place encircled by mountains that were beginning to accumulate their winter covering of snow, providing a stunning backdrop.
All in all a really busy few days but very rewarding… next year Houston!?
