Alumni Newsletter: Spring '99

New math lounge under construction

A portion of the Goergen Award money is being used to create an undergraduate mathematics lounge, a place where math students can study or just hang around. It is under construction at this time. It should be a comfortable place which we hope will become a magnet for undergraduate math activity. It is located on the ninth floor of the Hylan Building, the same floor as the math department's administrative offices. This central location should mean that it will be a natural place for students and faculty to stop by, linger, and interact. It is an attractive place with windows providing a nice view of the nearby Genesee River.

The Mathematics Department is especially pleased by the fact that this new lounge returns and reinforces a tradition of lively discussion of mathematics. The popular perception of mathematics (indeed, of any academic endeavor) is that it is done by isolated individuals who sit around and never talk to one another This is not true, understanding and progress are best fostered by a strong combination of group and individual activity. Our new lounge provides an environment where talking and thinking can be effectively combined.

Faculty and students have been busy suggesting a possible name for the new lounge. Among those suggested are: The Matrix, The Sink, The Source, The Pass (i.e. the saddle point), The Black Hole, The Limit Point, The Branch Point, The Strange Attractor. Liapunov Lounge, The Stable Manifold, The Unstable Manifold, La Place, The Limit Cycle, Uniform Convergence, The Neighborhood, Hilbert Space, The Klein Bottle, Leopoldos Lounge, The Moebius Room, Kummers Coffee House, Poincare's Place, Gauss' Grotto.