Musings on Mathematics

Here are some of my musing of the past few weeks.

A review of the 10th Younger Mathematicians Conference (held in Oxford May 2009) can be found here http://www.ima.org.uk/mathematics/mt_10thyoungermathematicians_conference_report.html. Have a read through as I think it might convince many of you to attend the next. Information on how to book up for the November 2009 Conference (to be held in Birmingham) is given here http://www.ima.org.uk/Conferences/11th_younger_mathematician.html .

Finally, some sense in the world, the Mathematician Alan Turing gets a posthumous apology. However, it is a sad reminder of how not very long ago even laws were very bigoted. Read the full story here, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/default.stm.

In March I attended the 16th Young Operational Research Conference which was held in Warwick, where I sat on the ‘Careers Panel ‘. One of the topics discussed was Chartership (and in the case of the OR Society Accreditation) and whether such professional qualifications were necessary. Whilst it does seem to be true, that few companies currently require professional qualifications. However, there are several good reasons why I believe professional status is a good thing to have on your CV:
· Shows a commitment to your own continuing professional development to the company you work for;
· Helps your company to show its customer that they employ professional who continue to maintain and develop their own skills;
· Helps show potential employers that you have wide range of skills and a commitment to your continued professional development.

For Mathematics and Operational research, it is also important because many other subjects (outside of these two) have had Chartership or professional status for years, which are completely understood and accepted by companies and help them when recruiting staff. We (in Maths and OR) are therefore lagging behind a bit and need to explain to our companies why Professional status is so important (and perhaps get them to pay for it).
I came across this the other day it looks to be a good source for science and Mathematics News http://www.sciencedaily.com/news/computers_math/mathematics/.

Please note that are all of the above are my own personal opinions and not necessarily the opinion of the’ Institute of Mathematics and its Applications’ or any other organisation I may have mentioned.