MAA Prizes and Awards Announced at MathFest 2005

The awarding of prizes for expository writing has long been one of the high points of MathFest. The Alder Award, for younger teachers, has added a prize for distinguished teaching to the annual MathFest awards ceremony.


Carl Cowen presides over the awards session at the Albuquerque MathFest, August 2005

The full prize booklet, which includes citations and responses by the winners, can be viewed with Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Trevor Evans Award for articles published in Math Horizons

   Robert L. Devaney
for "Chaos Rules!",
Math Horizons, November 2004, pp. 11-14.


George Pólya Award for articles published in the College Mathematics Journal

There were two Pólya Awards this year:

   Brian Hopkins and Robin J. Wilson for "The Truth About Königsberg"
College Mathematics Journal, v. 35, May 2004, pp. 198-207.
   Stephen M. Walk
for "Mind Your s and s"
College Mathematics Journal, v. 35, November 2004, pp. 362-369.


Carl B. Allendoerfer Award for articles published in Mathematics Magazine

Robert B. Eggleton and William P. Galvin (posthumously)
for "Upper Bounds on the Sum of Principal Divisors of an Integer", Mathematics Magazine, v. 77, June 2004, pp. 190-200.

Professor Eggleton was unable to attend.


Lester R. Ford Award for articles published in The American Mathematical Monthly

There were five Ford Awards this year:

Mamikon Mnatsakanian		    Tom Apostol and Mamikon Mnatsakanian
for a series of three articles:
  • "Isoperimetric and Isoparametric Problems", The American Mathematical Monthly, v. 111, no.2, February 2004, pp. 118-136.
  • "A Fresh Look at the Method of Archimedes", The American Mathematical Monthly, v. 111, no.6, June/July 2004, pp. 496-508.
  • "Figures Circumscribing Circles", The American Mathematical Monthly, v. 111, no.10, December 2004, pp. 853-863.


Henry Cohn		    Henry Cohn
for "Projective Geometry over 1 and the Gaussian Binomial Coefficients"
The American Mathematical Monthly, v. 111, no.6, June/July 2004, pp. 487-495.


Alan Edelman		    Alan Edelman and Gilbert Strang
for "Pascal Matrices"
The American Mathematical Monthly, v. 111, no.3, March 2004, pp. 361-385.

Steven Finch and John Wetzel
for "Lost in a Forest"
The American Mathematical Monthly, v. 111, no.8, October 2004, pp. 645-654.

Professors Finch and Wetzel were unable to attend.

Judith Grabiner
for "Newton, Maclaurin, and the Authority of Mathematics"
The American Mathematical Monthly, v. 111, no.10, December 2004, pp. 841-852.

Professor Grabiner was unable to attend.


Merten M. Hasse Prize for a noteworthy expository paper appearing in an MAA publication, at least one of whose authors is a younger mathematician

   Maureen Carroll and Stephen Dougherty
for "Tic-Tac-Toe on a Finite Plane"
Mathematics Magazine, v. 77, no.4, October 2004, pp. 260-274.


Chauvenet Prize for Expository Writing

The Chauvenet Prize is given for an outstanding expository article on a mathematical topic by a member of the Association.

   John Stillwell
for "The Story of the 120-Cell"
Notices of the AMS, January 2001, pp. 17-24.


Henry L. Alder Award for Distinguished Teaching by a Beginning College or University Mathematics Faculty Member

The Alder Awards honor beginning college or university faculty whose teaching has been extraordinarily successful and whose work is known to have had influence beyond their own classrooms. This years winners are:

Matthew DeLong
Taylor University		 Sarah Greenwald
Appalachian State University		 Laura Taalman
James Madison University