Message from Department Head Xiaobing Feng
Dear friends of the UT Department of Mathematics,
As the 2023-2024 academic year has wound down, let us reflect on a remarkable year and look ahead to the future.
Riding on the momentum of 2022-2023, our department continued to rise along with the university’s rise. We had another phenomenal year of growth. We hired one full professor, one associate professor, and one assistant professor. Twelve new full-time lecturers joined our department, adding needed teaching power for service math courses. Two full-time staff members also joined our department to manage the Testing Support Center and the Math Place, providing critically important service for our instructors and all University of Tennessee, Knoxville, students. The department welcomed a record 34 graduate students, and the total number of graduate teaching assistants (GTAs) has exceeded 100. Finally, incoming math majors increased from 30 to 40, and math honors jumped from 17 to 28. With a new actuarial science program, it is expected that math majors will significantly increase in the next few years.
As the university grows, so does the Department of Mathematics. While building on the department’s strengths in both pure and applied mathematical research and graduate education, we have been investing in future growth in cutting-edge and impactful areas such as artificial intelligence, data science, and machine learning, by hiring more faculty in those areas. Moreover, we have been collaborating with other departments within the College of Arts and Sciences (such as physics, chemistry, and biology) and units outside the college or university (e.g., industrial engineering, mechanical engineering, health sciences, electrical engineering and computer science, the UT Institute of Agriculture, the UT-Oak Ridge Innovation Institute’s Bredesen Center, and Oak Ridge National Lab) for interdisciplinary research and projects.
Mathematics, which is the language of sciences, engineering/technology, and economics/finance, is ubiquitous and plays an increasing role in modern sciences, engineering, industry, and society. We believe that a strong Department of Mathematics is a necessity for the university and are dedicated to actively contributing to the realization of UT’s strategic vision. Through outstanding research, interdisciplinary collaboration, and unwavering commitment to transformational education, our goal is to continue to shape the future of mathematics and inspire new generations of scholars.
The past year also was marked by a comprehensive Academic Program Review (APR), which occurs once every 10 years. Although the onsite review by an external committee took only three days, its preparation spanned over six months by our departmental APR committee.
The goal of a comprehensive APR is for the university to evaluate the department’s effectiveness in teaching, research/creative activity, and service. It also provides the department opportunities for self-study and analysis about what it has done and to plan for the future. Moreover, it provides a valuable opportunity for the department administration to discuss with the college and university administrations the department’s concerns, needs, and vision, and seek their help to achieve the department’s goals and mission.
An external APR committee came to UT from March 31–April 2, 2024, submitted an evaluation report, and made constructive recommendations. Here are a few excerpts:
- “The department has clearly demonstrated a willingness and an ability to serve the mission of the university. No other department on campus has served the university to this degree ….”
- “Despite its stretched resources, the tenure-line faculty, lecturers, and GTAs do an excellent job handling increased enrollments and serving the many undergraduates that take mathematics courses at UT. The commitment to teaching and to the department as a whole, and the overall morale of the lecturers, is striking.”
- “The (math department) tenure-line faculty research contributions are world-class and have an impact in a variety of areas of mathematics and its application.” “The mathematical biology program, which started on campus 30 years ago and ultimately resulted in securing a major NSF center in NIMBioS, was one of campus’s crown jewels.”
The APR committee’s report was overall positive, objective, and constructive. Our department will collaborate with the college and university administrations to implement recommendations from the report in the next few years. For example, the department will create a course scheduling manager post to improve the efficiency in making teaching assignments and develop policies for incentivizing faculty to obtain external research grants and advise graduate students to write theses and dissertations.
In the pages that follow, you will find selected profiles of our faculty, graduate students, and undergraduate math majors, as well as information about our Board of Visitors. I hope you enjoy reading about the many wonderful things that happened in our department over the past year.
With gratitude and best wishes,
Xiaobing Feng
Professor and head