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Shiing-Shen Chern (1911-2004) was a Chinese mathematician internationally recognized as the foremost differential geometer of his time. Chern was a Member in the School of Mathematics at the Institute for Advanced Study on numerous occasions beginning in 1943 through 1964.

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The word Greek comes across our educational years time and time again. In history we read about them in Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman Empire, in religion we read about the legendary Greek Gods, in language we read about their symbolism and literature. The Ancient Greeks are famously known for their history, literature, arts, science, philosophy and religion. However there is one field the Greeks have mastered in, mathematics that we do not appreciate as much as we should be. Therefore this article summarizes the greatest personalities in the ancient Greek history. Being a mathematician is not an easy task but the Greek seems to have mastered in the field. Here is a list of the top 15 famous Greek mathematicians and their contributions!

The author/writer and mathematician took the advantage of his knowledge over the two fields to write several scientific researches. The Great treatise is one of his renowned works now known as Almagest.

Xenocrates is known to have written a book on numbers, theory of numbers and geometry. He had the unique talent of calculating the syllables out of an alphabet. One attempted to find the total number of syllables that could be made from the letters of the alphabet.

14. Antiphon
Antiphon was the first to give an upper and lower bound for the values of Pi by inscribing and then circumscribing a polygon around a circle and finally proceeding to calculate the polygons areas. The method was applied to squaring the circle. He made comprehensive changes in the world of mathematics through his profound knowledge over the subject such that is known and applied in the modern day.

15. Diocles
Diocles was a philosopher, priest, an emperor, mathematician and geometer. This famous mathematician was most popularly known for his work in the sub classification of geometry. His name is associated with the geometric curve called the Cissoid of Diocles. This method was used in solving the problem of doubling the cube.

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15 Famous Greek Mathematicians and Their Contributions

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The word Greek comes across our educational years time and time again. In history we read about them in Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman Empire, in religion we read about the legendary Greek Gods, in language we read about their symbolism and literature. The Ancient Greeks are famously known for their history, literature, arts, science, philosophy and religion.

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When Ruth Gonzalez received her Ph.D. in applied mathematics in 1986 from Rice University, she became the first U.S.-born Hispanic woman to earn a doctorate in mathematics. Her thesis in computational mathematics, written under the supervision of Mary Wheeler, was entitled “Domain Decomposition for…

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Vice President George H.W. Bush answers questions from students during a visit to Garfield High School in East Los Angeles on May 5, 1988. Bush is wearing a jacket presented to him by Escalante. (Douglas C. Pizac / Associated Press)

Jaime Escalante, the charismatic former East Los Angeles high school teacher who taught the nation that inner-city students could master subjects as demanding as calculus, died Tuesday. He was 79.

The subject of the 1988 film "Stand and Deliver," Escalante died at his son's home in Roseville, Calif., said actor Edward James Olmos, who portrayed the teacher in the film. Escalante had bladder cancer.

"Jaime didn't just teach math. Like all great teachers, he changed lives," Olmos said earlier this month when he organized an appeal for funds to help pay Escalante's mounting medical bills.

Escalante gained national prominence in the aftermath of a 1982 scandal surrounding 14 of his Garfield High School students who passed the Advanced Placement calculus exam only to be accused later of cheating.

The story of their eventual triumph -- and of Escalante's battle to raise standards at a struggling campus of working-class, largely Mexican American students -- became the subject of the movie, which turned the balding, middle-aged Bolivian immigrant into the most famous teacher in America.

Passionate teacher

Escalante was a maverick who did not get along with many of his public school colleagues, but he mesmerized students with his entertaining style and deep understanding of math. Educators came from around the country to observe him at Garfield, which built one of the largest and most successful Advanced Placement programs in the nation.

"Jaime Escalante has left a deep and enduring legacy in the struggle for academic equity in American education," said Gaston Caperton, former West Virginia governor and president of the College Board, which sponsors the Scholastic Assessment Test and the Advanced Placement exams.

"His passionate belief [was] that all students, when properly prepared and motivated, can succeed at academically demanding course work, no matter what their racial, social or economic background. Because of him, educators everywhere have been forced to revise long-held notions of who can succeed."

Escalante's rise came during an era decried by experts as one of alarming mediocrity in the nation's schools. He pushed for tougher standards and accountability for students and educators, often irritating colleagues and parents along the way with his brusque manner and uncompromising stands.

He was called a traitor for his opposition to bilingual education. He said the hate mail he received for championing Proposition 227, the successful 1998 ballot measure to dismantle bilingual programs in California, was a factor in his decision to retire that year after leaving Garfield and teaching at Hiram Johnson High School in Sacramento for seven years.

He moved back to Bolivia, where he propelled himself into a classroom again, apparently intent on fulfilling a vow to die doing what he knew best -- teach. But he returned frequently to the United States to speak to education groups and continued to ally himself with conservative politics. He considered becoming an education advisor to President George W. Bush, and in 2003 signed on as an education consultant for Arnold Schwarzenegger's gubernatorial campaign in California.

Escalante was born Dec. 31, 1930, in La Paz, Bolivia, and was raised by his mother after his parents, both schoolteachers, split when he was about 9. He attended a well-regarded Jesuit high school, San Calixto, where his quick mind and penchant for mischief often got him into trouble.

After high school, he served in the army during a short-lived Bolivian rebellion. Although he had toyed with the idea of attending engineering school in Argentina, he wound up enrolling at the Bolivian state teachers college, Normal Superior. Before he graduated, he was teaching at three top-rated Bolivian schools. He also married Fabiola Tapia, a fellow student at the college.

At his wife's urging, Escalante gave up his teaching posts for the promise of a brighter future in the United States for their firstborn, Jaime Jr. (A second son, Fernando, would follow.) With $3,000 in his pocket and little more than "yes" and "no" in his English vocabulary, Escalante flew alone to Los Angeles on Christmas Eve 1963. He was 33.

His wife and son later joined him in Pasadena, where his first job was mopping floors in a coffee shop across the street from Pasadena City College, where he enrolled in English classes. Within a few months, he was promoted to cook, slinging burgers by day and studying for an associate's degree in math and physics by night. That led to a better-paying job as a technician at a Pasadena electronics company, where he became a prized employee. But the classroom still beckoned to the teacher inside him. He earned a scholarship to Cal State Los Angeles to pursue a teaching credential. In the fall of 1974, when he was 43, he took a pay cut to begin teaching at Garfield High at a salary of $13,000.

"My friends said, 'Jaime, you're crazy.' But I wanted to work with young people," he told The Times. "That's more rewarding for me than the money."

When he arrived at the school, he was dismayed to learn he had been assigned to teach the lowest level of math. He grew unhappier still when he discovered how watered-down the math textbooks were -- on a par with fifth-grade work in Bolivia. Faced with unruly students, he began to wish for his old job back.

Motivating students

But Escalante stayed, soon developing a reputation for turning around hard-to-motivate students. By 1978, he had 14 students enrolled in his first AP calculus class. Of the five who survived his stiff homework and attendance demands, only two earned passing scores on the exam.

But in 1980, seven of nine students passed the exam; in 1981, 14 of 15 passed.

In 1982, he had 18 students to prepare for the academic challenge of their young lives.

At his insistence, they studied before school, after school and on Saturdays, with Escalante as coach and cheerleader. Some of them lacked supportive parents, who needed their teenagers to work to help pay bills. Other students had to be persuaded to spend less time on the school band or in athletics. Yet all gradually formed an attachment to calculus and to "Kimo," their nickname for Escalante, inspired by Tonto's nickname for the Lone Ranger, Kemo Sabe.

Escalante was hospitalized twice in the months leading up to the AP exam. He had a heart attack while teaching night school but ignored doctors' orders to rest and was back at Garfield the next day.

Then he disappeared one weekend to have his gallbladder removed. As Washington Post reporter Jay Mathews recounted in his 1988 book, "Escalante: The Best Teacher in America," the hard-driving teacher turned the health problem into another weapon in his bag of tricks. "You burros give me a heart attack," he repeatedly told his students when he returned. "But I come back! I'm still the champ."

The guilt-making mantra was effective. One student said, "If Kimo can do it, we can do it. If he wants to teach us that bad, we can learn."

The Advanced Placement program qualifies students for college credit if they pass the exam with a score of 3 or higher. For many years it was a tool of the elite; the calculus exam, for example, was taken by only about 3% of American high school math students when Escalante revived the program at Garfield in the late 1970s.

In 1982, a record 69 Garfield students were taking AP exams in various subjects, including Spanish and history. Escalante's calculus students took their exam in May under the watchful eye of the school's head counselor. The results, released over the summer, were stunning: All 18 of his students passed, with seven earning the highest score of 5.

But the good news quickly turned bad.

Testing controversy

The Educational Testing Service, which administers the exam, said it had found suspicious similarities in the solutions given on 14 exams. It invalidated those scores.

The action angered the students, who thought the service would not have questioned their scores if they were white. But this was Garfield, a school made up primarily of lower-income Mexican Americans that only a few years earlier had nearly lost its accreditation. "There's a tremendous amount of feeling that the Hispanic is incapable of handling higher math and science," Escalante reflected later in an interview with Newsday.

He, like many in the Garfield community, feared the students were victims of a racist attack, a charge that Educational Testing Service strongly denied. Two of the students told Mathews of the Washington Post that some cheating had occurred, but they later recanted their confessions.

Vindication came in a retest. Of the 14 accused of wrongdoing, 12 took the exam again and passed.

After that, the numbers of Garfield students taking calculus and other Advanced Placement classes soared. By 1987, only four high schools in the country had more students taking and passing the AP calculus exam than Garfield.

Escalante's dramatic success raised public consciousness of what it took to be not just a good teacher but a great one. One of the most astute analyses of his classroom style came from the actor who shadowed him for days before portraying him in "Stand and Deliver."

"He's the most stylized man I've ever come across," Olmos, who received an Oscar nomination for his performance, told the New York Times in 1988. "He had three basic personalities -- teacher, father-friend and street-gang equal -- and he would juggle them, shift in an instant. . . . He's one of the greatest calculated entertainers."

Ultimate performer

Escalante was the ultimate performer in class, cracking jokes, rendering impressions and using all sorts of props -- from basketballs and wind-up toys to meat cleavers and space-alien dolls -- to explain complex mathematical concepts.

Sports analogies abounded. A perfect parabola, for instance, was like a sky-hook by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. "Calculus Does Not Have To Be Made Easy -- It Is Easy Already," read a banner Escalante kept in his classroom.

In 1991, he packed up his bag of tricks and quit Garfield, saying he was fed up with faculty politics and petty jealousies.

He headed to Hiram Johnson High with the intention of testing his methods in a new environment.

But in seven years there, he never had more than about 14 calculus students a year and a 75% pass rate, a record he blamed on administrative turnover and cultural differences.

At Garfield, where the pass rate was above 90% when he left, his success was aided by a supportive principal, Henry Gradillas, and talented colleagues, including award-winning calculus teacher Ben Jimenez.

Return to Bolivia

Thirty-five years after leaving Bolivia for his journey into teaching fame, Escalante went home.

He settled with his wife in her hometown of Cochabamba and became a part-time mathematics professor at the Universidad del Valle, and was still teaching calculus in Bolivia in 2008.

He returned to the United States frequently to visit his son and give motivational speeches.

He made his last trip to the U.S. to seek treatment for the cancer that had left him unable to walk or speak above a whisper.

This month, as he gave himself over to a Reno clinic's regimen of pills, teas and ointments, many of his former students gathered at Garfield to raise money.

Unpopular with fellow teachers, he won few major teaching awards in the United States. He liked to be judged by his results, a concept still resisted by the majority of his profession.

As he faced death, it was still the results that mattered to him -- the young minds he held captive three decades ago who today are engineers, lawyers, doctors, teachers and administrators.

"I had many opportunities in this country, but the best I found in East L.A.," he said in one of his last interviews. "I am proudest of my brilliant students."

Escalante is survived by his wife, his sons and six grandchildren.

elaine.woo@latimes.com

Times staff writer Robert J. Lopez contributed to this report.

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Jaime Escalante dies at 79; math teacher who challenged East L.A. students to 'Stand and Deliver'

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Vice President George H.W. Bush answers questions from students during a visit to Garfield High School in East Los Angeles on May 5, 1988. Bush is wearing a jacket presented to him by Escalante. (Douglas C.

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Why Is Mohamed M. Atalla Influential?

According to Wikipedia, Mohamed M. Atalla was an Egyptian-American engineer, physical chemist, cryptographer, inventor and entrepreneur. He was a semiconductor pioneer who made important contributions to modern electronics. He is best known for inventing the MOSFET in 1959 , which along with Atalla's earlier surface passivation and thermal oxidation processes, revolutionized the electronics industry. He is also known as the founder of the data security company Atalla Corporation , founded in 1972. He received the Stuart Ballantine Medal and was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame for his important contributions to semiconductor technology as well as data security.

Other Resources About Mohamed M. Atalla

What Schools Are Affiliated With Mohamed M. Atalla?

Mohamed M. Atalla is affiliated with the following schools:

Mohamed M. Atalla's AcademicInfluence.com Rankings

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According to Wikipedia , Mohamed M. Atalla was an Egyptian-American engineer, physical chemist, cryptographer, inventor and entrepreneur. He was a semiconductor pioneer who made important contributions to modern electronics. He is best known for inventing the MOSFET in 1959 , which along with Atalla's earlier surface passivation and thermal oxidation processes, revolutionized the electronics industry.

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Université de Kinshasa, Batiment administratif, Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo

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Université de Kinshasa, Batiment administratif, Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo

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Université de Kinshasa, Batiment administratif, Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo

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Education

1990 : PhD. Nonlinear Analysis. Université catholique de Louvain, Belgique

1985 : DEA. Nonlinear Analysis. Université catholique de Louvain, Belgique

1982 : MSc. Mathematics. Université Laval, Québec, Canada

1979 : BSc. Mathematics. Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada.

Professional experience

1982-1984 : Assistante (junior lecturer), Université de Kinshasa

1991-1995 : Associate professor

1996-2000 : Professor

2001- : Ordinary Professor

1994-2000 : Vice-Doyen Faculté des Sciences

2009- : Directrice de l'Ecole Doctorale en Mathématiques

2011- : Recteur de l'Université Notre-Dame de Tshumbe.

How did you discover your passion for mathematics? Or When have you decided to be a mathematician and why?
I liked mathematics. I discovered my passion for mathematics since my childhood

What fascinates you about Mathematics?
The reasoning since my young age. At the High School, I was seduced by Analysis, and trigonometry I was fan of argumentations and proofs. This leads my choice of analysis at the university.

Has anyone influenced your decision to become a mathematician ?
My decision was influenced by my teachers and my father.

Has anyone supported you in your choice and during your career?
No, once my choice was done, I was able to go on myself.

Were there any specific factors that helped you succeed and What challenges did you encounter on the way?
My work. I worked hard.
Challenges of all kinds: During my undergraduate and graduate training in Canada I faced many challenges. I was the only African woman in my class and in my Department. I had to double effort to be better and remove negative prejudices in the heads of my colleagues and my professors to be accepted. But in view of results, I was not only accepted but invited by groups of colleagues for research works. After my Master and Doctorate, I had to overcome the reluctance and masochism of male colleagues. Some act out of ignorance or jealousy.

What is the funniest or most memorable thing that has happened to you while working in mathematics?
The most memorable thing that happens in my career was the dissertation defense of two of my students the same day. The most ugly and ridiculous thing was lately the accusation by a male colleague who publish in a newspaper of the City that I have power of spell that's way I manage and succeed what I do.

Do you come from an academic family? How does your family regard your career choice? Is it hard to manage both career and private life?
My parents are not academics but some of my brothers and sisters have their Masters diploma. My family is proud of me. There is no conflict, I can manage both together.

What were the biggest obstacles you had to overcome?
To become Professor of Mathematics and the first woman in my country.

Did you ever have the impression that it would be easier/harder if you were male?
Yes, because of male prejudices.

What kind of prejudices did you have to face?
Jealousy, I just gave a story that passed to a newspaper of Kinshasa. To see a woman occupy important positions such as Dean, Director of Doctoral School or Vice-Chancellor disturbs men.

How did that make you feel? Were you able to overcome these? I was shocked but not for long. I am at ease and do my job even better. Do you have anything else that you'd like to tell us about?
Mathematics is fantastic; as its name is female, it is a domain that should belong to us women.

Tell us about the organizations for women mathematicians that you are a part of? How has this helped your career?
I belong to AWMA, the AFMC (association of Congolese women mathematicians), the AFPC (association of Congolese women professor of university), AAMU, SAMSA etc.... All these associations have come into my life after being well established in my career, but they help me to leave a good legacy to young people.

Do you consider it necessary to organize special programs like Girl's Day promoting mathematics for girls in schools? What else, do you think, could further be done to support woman with mathematics as their career?
I think it's important to awaken the curiosity of kids. It would also be important for governors to offer scholarship or support for the academic fees of girls enrolled in mathematics classes at the University.

Teaching mathematics, especially to non-mathematicians, can be a challenge. What is your strategy to catch and keep the attention of your audience?
I try to make mathematics alive by taking examples in everyday life. For example, I know that each of them once went to the market, haggled and compared prices and quantities. I explain to them from this fact, the derivation of their variable quantity according to the price, and then I generalize on an abstract case.

How would you explain your research to a layman (non-specialist)?
A little complicated, but I try to find examples in practical life to introduce my subject.

Can you tell us about the applications of your research, if any?
By modeling with differential equations (ODE and PDE), I made several applications in epidemiology. Recently, I have just written a multidisciplinary application of a metapopulation model in social psychology and Law. A publisher who read the paper invited me to write a book.

What are your biggest achievements, and what your biggest failures?
My biggest achievement is that I am happy to be a professor of mathematics. I have a lot of students. My biggest failure is that there are not many women professors, in DRC. I already prepared three, but they went away (USA, Brazil) with their husbands to work. I don't have another women professor but I am not discouraged, I am preparing two others in PhD.

Do you have a dream? Any particular problem you dream to solve now?
My Dream is that: mathematics become a normal women career in Africa

Which advice would you give to young girls who want to engage a career in Mathematics?
Mathematics can open any doors for a beautiful career. Do and love mathematics.

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Education 1990 : PhD. Nonlinear Analysis. Université catholique de Louvain, Belgique 1985 : DEA. Nonlinear Analysis. Université catholique de Louvain, Belgique 1982 : MSc. Mathematics. Université Laval, Québec, Canada 1979 : BSc. Mathematics. Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada.

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University Of Benin (Main Campus), Ugbowo-Lagos Road, Benin City, Nigeria

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University Of Benin (Main Campus), Ugbowo-Lagos Road, Benin City, Nigeria

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University Of Benin (Main Campus), Ugbowo-Lagos Road, Benin City, Nigeria

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Grace Alele Williams

Born:

place: Nigeria

Ph.D. Mathematics Education (1963) University of Chicago
thesis: ; advisor:

area of degree:

Grace Alele Williams received her education at Queens College in Lagos, University College at Ibadan, and the University of Vermont, before receiving a Ph.D. in mathematics education from the University of Chicago in 1963. She made history as the first Nigerian woman to be awarded a doctorate. She returned to Nigeria for a couple of years' postdoctoral work at the University of Ibadan before joining the faculty of the University of Lagos in 1965.

Dr. Williams' ongoing interest in mathematics education was originally sparked by her stay in the US, which coincided with the Sputnik phenomenon. Working with the African Mathematics Program in Newton, Massachusetts, under the leadership of MIT professor Ted Martins, she participated in mathematics workshops held in various African cities from 1963 to 1975. Highlights included writing texts and correspondence courses covering basic concepts in mathematics, working in concert with leading mathematicians and educators. She taught at the University of Lagos from 1965 to 1985, and spent a decade directing the Institute of Education, which introduced innovative non degree programmes, with many of the certificate recipients older women working as elementary school teachers.

Appointed the first female Vice Chancellor of a Nigerian university in 1985, Professor Williams believes her appointment at the University of Benin, which ended in 1992, was a test case to demonstrate a women's executive capability. She is now Professor of Mathematics Education at the University of Lagos. Among her honors are those of Fellow of the Mathematical Association of Nigeria and of the Nigerian Academy of Education; Merit Award Winner of Bendel State in Nigeria; and Regional Vice President for Africa of the Third World Organization for Women in Science" (Science in Africa: Women Leading from Strength AAAS, Washington, 1993, p.174). It may be added that Professor Williams is also the Chairwoman of AMUCWMA, the African Mathematical Union Commission for Women in Mathematics.

DR. Grace Alele Williams is also a Vice President and member of the Executive board of The Third World Organization for Women in Science ( TWOWS).

Among Williams' papers related to the African Mathematics Program are the following:

The Entebbe Mathematics Project, in: International Review of education, UNESCO, Hamburg, 17, No. 2, 1971, 210-214

Dynamics of curriculum change in mathematics: Lagos State Mathematics Project, in: West African Journal of Education, 18, No. 2, 1974, 241-253

The development of a modern mathematics curriculum in Africa, in: Arithmetic Teacher, No. 4, 1976, 254-261

Reference: [AMUCHMA12]
back to Black Women in the Mathematical Sciences

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CONTACT Dr. Williams

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Grace Alele Williams - Black Women in Mathematics

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Grace Alele Williams Born: place: Nigeria Ph.D. Mathematics Education (1963) University of Chicago thesis: ; advisor: area of degree: Grace Alele Williams received her education at Queens College in Lagos, University College at Ibadan, and the University of Vermont, before receiving a Ph.D. in mathematics education from the University of Chicago in 1963.

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Valley of Mexico, State of Mexico, Mexico

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Valley of Mexico, State of Mexico, Mexico

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Valley of Mexico, State of Mexico, Mexico

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The Aztecs, who ruled central Mexico for several hundred years before the Spanish arrived in 1519, left the most extensive mathematical writings of any pre-Columbian people. Two manuscripts in particular have intrigued scholars because they portray land holdings in the Valley of Mexico along with their measurements, using the Aztec numbering system, for purposes of taxation. Now a geographer and a mathematician have zeroed in on just what methods Aztec surveyors used to measure the surface of a field in one of these documents, the Codex Vergara.

Scientists long ago deciphered the Aztec number system, a vigesimal system (using 20 as its base) as opposed to our decimal system. In Aztec arithmetic, a dot equals 1, a bar represents 5, and there are other symbols for 20 and various multiples thereof. The Codex Vergara, painted about 1540, contains schematic drawings and measurements of individual fields. Previous research on it has revealed an understanding of multiplication and division as well as certain principles of geometry.

Now, Barbara Williams of the University of Wisconsin-Rock County in Janesville, with Maria del Carmen Jorge y Jorge of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, has analyzed the Codex Vergara to discover just how Aztec surveyors estimated land area in parcels that were often irregularly shaped. The analysis reveals a "very practical kind of arithmetic and record keeping," says Michael Smith, an archaeologist at Arizona State University, Tempe.

In a paper published in tomorrow's issue of (4 April, p. 72) the authors show that Aztec surveyors probably used several types of algorithms to calculate area. Some parcels involved simply multiplying length by width. But in other, irregular four-sided lots, they had to come up with different approaches, such as multiplying the average of two opposite sides by an adjacent side.

Furthermore, when a measurement did not match a precise number of "land rods"--their standard unit of linear measurement, which corresponded to about 2.5 meters--the Aztecs added symbols, such as an arrow, a heart, a hand, or a bone, to indicate remaining length that was less than one rod. Working back from the recorded land areas, the authors determined that these corresponded to different fractions of a land rod.

Although the Aztecs are the only early Americans to have left these kinds of technical documents, it's reasonable to assume that other groups such as the numerically sophisticated Maya used similar systems, Smith says. "There's a view that ancient peoples were obsessed with religion and that science and knowledge were all directed at religious ends," he adds. But the paper shows that the Aztecs apparently liked to get their measurements right--and certainly when it came to taxation.
Related site

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The Aztecs, who ruled central Mexico for several hundred years before the Spanish arrived in 1519, left the most extensive mathematical writings of any pre-Columbian people. Two manuscripts in particular have intrigued scholars because they portray land holdings in the Valley of Mexico along with their measurements, using the Aztec numbering system, for purposes of taxation.