The SIAM Visiting Lecturer Program (VLP) provides the community with a roster of experienced and inspirational applied mathematicians and computational scientists in industry, government, and academia, who can speak on topics that are of interest to developing professional mathematicians.
Learn more about the following speakers from Arizona, Illinois, Colorado, and Minnesota and contact them if you are interested in them speaking at your institution.
Cleve Moler
Founder and Chief Mathematician, MathWorks | Prescott, Arizona, U.S.
Job Description: Computational Scientist, MATLAB Developer
Other Positions: Chairman, Computer Science and Professor, Mathematics, Univ. New Mexico
Education: B.S. Mathematics, Caltech / Ph.D. Mathematics, Stanford
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: Evolution of MATLAB / General audience
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: The Singular Value Decomposition Saves the Universe / Undergraduate math majors and beyond
Sheldon Jacobson
Founder Professor of Computer Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign | Urbana, Illinois, U.S.
Job Description: Professor of Computer Science
Education: B.S. in Mathematics / M.S. in Mathematics / Ph.D. in Operations Research
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: Geographic Districting and Political Gerrymandering / General audience
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: Aviation Security and Risk Assessment / Can be tailored to a technical or nontechnical audience (same for Topic 1)
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: The mathematics of March Madness / n be tailored to a technical or nontechnical audience (same for Topic 1)
Geographical Constraints: Prefers flying
Stephanie Fitchett
Data Scientist, Transamerica | Boulder, Colorado, U.S.
Other Positions: Statistician, Neptune and Company, Inc.
Education: B.S. in Mathematics / M.S. in Mathematics, M.S. in Statistics / Ph.D. in Mathematics
Other information: Rotating program officer in the Division of Undergraduate Education at the National Science Foundation
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: Data science in life insurance underwriting / Undergraduate math majors and beyond
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: The interdisciplinary world of data science / Can be adjusted to any of the above audiences
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: Evaluating estimates of solar power for an electric utility / Undergraduate math majors and beyond
Chris Bemis
Head of Quantitative Analysis and Research, Whitebox Advisors | Minneapolis, Minnesota, U.S.
Job Description: Team lead for researching, implementing, and supporting quantitative strategies for hedge fund trading.
Other Positions: Adjunct Professor at the University of Minnesota
Education: B.S. in Mathematics / M.S. in Mathematics / Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: Constraints and investor views in portfolio optimization: a Bayesian-like interpretation / Graduate math students and beyond
Possible Lecture Topic and Audience: Practical implementation of math finance models; what works and what doesn't, and why industrial math is so interesting / Undergraduate math majors and beyond
Learn more about hosting a speaker at your institution by visiting the Program Guidelines.