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Message from the Department Head
-Carl Cowen
I hope you will enjoy our "summer" issue of PUrview. Many math alums undoubtedly have spent one or more summers in West Lafayette. Perhaps as an undergrad or grad student you took a summer course or worked a summer job on campus or in the community. Looking back, you may recall that during the summer everything and everyone moved at a slower pace, and the campus was considerably more calm than during the regular term.
Let me assure you that things have changed! Throughout the months of May, June, July and August, the campus is abuzz with various activities and numerous visitors. Large national organizations find Purdue's excellent residence hall system and meeting facilities attractive, and so our campus becomes a major conference venue. In addition to the regular eight week summer session and the various four-week summer school modules, a number of professional workshops and programs for high school and college students are held on campus. One such program is the Minority Science Students Project (MSSP), which you can read more about on page 12. Add to these activities the many visits during June and July by incoming freshmen and their parents, most of whom come for one day as part of the "Day on Campus" program so the new students can register for fall classes and become acquainted with the campus. Well, you get the picture!
This summer, the Math Department proudly hosted a very special event--a retirement banquet for Professor Bob Zink. I can think of few faculty at Purdue who have contributed as much to Purdue and the Mathematics Department as Bob has during the past 45 years. Because of his personality, interest in students, and teaching skills, he drew many, many students into mathematics. Bob's excellence as a teacher was most recently recognized by the University in 1996, when he was chosen to receive a Charles B. Murphy Award for outstanding undergraduate teaching. Bob generously served the Department and the University, actively participating on departmental committees concerned with undergraduate education and supervising the selection of recipients of two annual departmental undergraduate awards since the inception of those awards. From 1963 to 1974, six students earned Ph.D.'s under Bob's guidance. He served as Assistant Head of the Department from 1965-69 and as Assistant Dean of the Graduate School from 1969-72. Throughout the years he has been actively involved with many student and professional organizations, honoraries, and the University Senate.
We were very pleased that a number of people were able to travel to West Lafayette for Bob's retirement dinner on June 26. In addition to his three sons from Texas, Minnesota, and Maryland, two of Bob's Ph.D. students--Ralph Alexander, retired from the University of Illinois, and Steve Schonefeld from Tri-State University--attended and gave testimonials about their experiences with Bob. Also present were long-time friends and former students who traveled from Alabama, Colorado, Georgia, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio (and even Indiana!). In order to give everyone an opportunity to share in the spirit of that special evening, we have included in this issue several photos, as well as transcripts of the tributes given at the banquet by Bob's colleagues, Professors J. J. Price and William Fuller.
All too quickly summer will end. Faculty members will return from conferences and trips abroad, students will move back to campus to begin classes on August 24, and the cycle of activities around which the academic year revolves will recommence. As I begin my second year as Head of the Mathematics Department, I very much look forward to the 1998-99 academic year and the challenges ahead.
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