AY 2026 Graduate and Continuing Majors
This year Cassandra Suryan secured her
well-earned BS in mathematics. Well done Cassandra! Upcoming majors who will be holding down the fort include Remi Wiley, Dylan Wood, Dylan Jackson, Rhianna Yates, Genoa Mangusso, Erin Abbott, and other brand new mathematics majors/enthusiasts.
Rhianna was the recepient of this year's Ron Seater Award, and had a busy year beyond a heavy class load. She participated in the 2025 Cross-institutional Undergraduate Research Experience summer workshop, sponsored by the Intercollegiate Biomathematics Alliance and held at Illinois State University University in Normal, Illinois. After the workshop Rhianna collaborated with two other undergraduates (one from Morehead State University and the other from Pitzer College) on exploring an approach to constructing mathematical models to simulate animal migrations. They presented posters of their work at the 2025 Symposium of Biomathematics and Ecology: Education and Research, held at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. Rhianna also presented her poster at the UAS mathematics seminar and the annual UAS UReCA Symposium. Rhianna will be continuing her adventures in mathematics and marine biology through the student exchange program, first at Western Washington University and then down-under, either in Australia or New Zealand. Fun times ahead!
Dylan Jackson and Remi represented UAS at the annual Putnam Competition with Remi scoring higher than both the mean and median scores for the year. Considering the level of difficulty of this mathematics competition, this was a great accomplishment. Well done Remi!
As in the previous summer, Remi organized an informal summer research group in 2025 at UAS. He then continued his research by attending a week-long research workshop at the Institute for Computational and Experimental Research in Mathematics (ICERM) in Providence, Rhode Island with Andrzej Piotrowski.
As a result of a collaboration begun at this workshop, Remi co-authored a paper, Characteristic Polynomials for Ladder Tournaments, with two undergraduates from Carleton College, Northfield, Minnesota. This paper has been accepted for publication in the Pi Mu Epsilon journal. He also presented his research at the UAS mathematics seminar and the annual UAS UReCA Symposium. Again, well done Remi!
Math Club & Alaska Alpha Chapter of PME
The UAS Math Club/PME was pretty vibrant this year with bi-monthly meetings involving some very interesting problem solving sessions, and great treats. These meetings were well-attended, with new club members showing up to join in some great learning experiences. With the goal of attracting new mathematics majors/enthusiasts, Megan Buzby, Andrzej, and Remi engaged in some outreach by representing the UAS Mathematics Program (and the Math Club) at the annual UAS Open House.
The Math Club and the Alaska Alpha Chapter of Pi Mu Epsilon hosted two talks this year, both of which were well-attended. The first talk was by Dr. Patricia Commins, a postdoctoral scholar at the Simons Laufer Mathematical Sciences Institute in Berkley, California. The title of her talk was Trees, Colorings, and the Chromatic Symmetric Function. The next talk was by Elizabeth Bruch, a UAS Alumna and graduate student in the UAF Earth System Science program. Elizabeth talked about How the S and M Work Together in STEM! After their talks, both Patti and Elizabeth interacted with undergraduate attendees, sharing their experiences in graduate school with lots of useful tips on searching for suitable graduate programs and then surviving the rigors to follow.
Following tradition, the end-of-the-year UAS Math Club BBQ was held at the Lena Beach Sockeye Shelter.
This year's gathering was the largest in a while. The perfect weather, delicious food, great company, and lively conversation went on well past the amazing sunset.
Faculty News
Colleen Ianuzzi and Joe Liddle held down the mathematics/statistics fort at the Ketchikan and Sitka campuses, and Jill Dumesnil continued her involvement in and contributions to faculty advocacy as President of United Academics AAUP/AFT Local 4996.
Brian Blitz served on two committees, the first being the Arts and Sciences Strategic Planning Committee specifically directed toward the Student Success Initiative. The second committe was the UAS Governance group that met with the three finalists for the UA President search. He also participated in the UA Math Summit which included math faculty from UAA, UAF, and UAS. The goal of this gathering was to discuss current issues in the mathematics programs at the three institutions.
Megan Buzby continued serving as the UAS Mathematics Program's fearless leader and attended the 2026 meeting of the Pacific Northwest Section of the Mathematical Association of America and Project NExT, held at Linfield University in McMinnville, Oregon. This marked Megan's last year as the PNW Project NExT Section Director, passing the responsibility on to a colleague at the College of Idaho. She also attended the 2-day annual workshop of the Alaska Chapter of the American Statistical Association, held in Anchorage, on Spatial Linear Models for Environmental Data. Finally, she served as a judge for the international SIMIODE Challenge Using Differential Equations Modeling (SCUDEM) competition for high school and undergraduate students.
Andrzej Piotrowski became the first Science on Tap speaker at Devil's Club Brewing Co. in downtown Juneau. His talk, titled How to Make Pi, introduced the audience to many interesting facts about the number π (pi). Andrzej received an MAA INTEGRATE award that supported activities for the local high school Math Club, Enigma, served as a grader for the Putnam Competition, and had a paper published: S. Klanderman, M. Montee, A. Piotrowski, A. Rice, and B. Shader, Determinants of Seidel Tournament Matrices, Linear Algebra Appl., 707 (2025), pp. 126-151.
Chris Hay-Jahans continued with his involvement in the Provost's Assessment Committe on General Education Learning Outcomes, and as a member of the Intercollegiate Biomathematics Alliance (IBA) Board of Directors. He presented a short course on constructing SIR Models with Berkeley Madonna at the 2025 Cross-institutional Undergraduate Research Experience summer workshop, and then mentored three students from this workshop for a research project on using Berkeley Madonna to simulate animal migrations. The research group he mentored included three undergraduates, one from each of Morehead State University, Pitzer College, and UAS. Finally, he wrapped up work on the second edition of his first book, An R companion to linear statistical models, with Taylor & Francis Publishers.
Last but not least, Auguste Steihr and Gabe Wechter (both UAS mathematics graduates themselves) have been holding down the fort at the Juneau Campus Learning Center.
