You are here

Brian Hopkins Begins Term as CMJ Editor-Elect

Brian Hopkins and the College Mathematics Journal go way back. Back to the mid-nineties when Hopkins was in graduate school.

In the Problems and Solutions section of the May 1994 issue of the CMJ, in the “also solved by” list associated with problem 502 (“Pell’s Equation--Once Again”), sandwiched between Mack Hill (Worcester State) and R. Daniel Hurwitz (Skidmore College), you find the following text: “Brian Hopkins (student), U. of Washington.”

As the current editor-elect of the College Mathematics Journal, Hopkins takes especial pleasure in recounting how this is the first time his name ever appeared in print in a mathematics periodical.

Now a professor in the Department of Mathematics at St. Peter's University in Jersey City, New Jersey, Hopkins began his term as editor-elect of the CMJ on January 1, 2013. He will hold this position through the end of the year before serving as the publication's editor from 2014 through 2018.

Hopkins’s appointment was confirmed by the MAA Board of Governors at MAA MathFest in Madison, Wisconsin, in August 2012. He will succeed Michael Henle (Oberlin College) at the helm of CMJ.

Hopkins has big plans for the College Mathematics Journal.

He hopes to include more extensive auxiliary materials—such as exercise solutions, software code, technical proofs, and applets—on the CMJ’s Supplements to Articles webpage. He wants to put out a special issue of the CMJ on a roughly annual basis, delving into such topics as Rubik’s CubeRamsey theory, and experimental mathematics. He plans to solicit submissions from mathematically focused bloggers whose expository prose could be polished for print publication.

Hopkins earned his Ph.D. from the University of Washington for work on algebraic combinatorics related to the representation theory of Lie algebras. His professional interests range from graph theory and combinatorial number theory to undergraduate research and mathematics education.

In addition to editing Resources for Teaching Discrete Mathematics (MAA Notes No. 74), Hopkins has served as a referee for several journals and authored a number of articles, some in collaboration with colleagues. More than one of the pieces on his lengthy list of publications has “Kevin Bacon” in the title.

Hopkins won the 2005 George Pòlya Award for an article in the College Mathematics Journal titled “The Truth about Königsberg” and in 2011 was honored as Distinguished Teacher of the Year by the New Jersey Section of the MAA.

Contacted during the first month of his tenure, Hopkins reported via email that he was already interacting with authors and current and prospective editorial board members and sharing their excitement about CMJ. He’s definitely in a CMJ frame of mind. For example, he noted, he recently “attended an art show in NYC. I enjoyed looking around with an eye to future CMJ covers.”

News Date: 
Friday, February 1, 2013
Category: