Math problems often depend on knowing the formulas or techniques from a previous math class. “The problems we look at have a lot more to do with logic or common sense or just sitting and thinking about it for a while -- puzzling it out,” Gibson said. “It's closer to Wordle than a traditional math problem."

The math circles began at Franklin School, a Corvallis school with kindergarten through eighth grade. After starting in the primary grades, the circles extended to the middle school level and have since spread to other local elementary and middle schools.

Gibson hopes to spread the program to two more elementary schools by next fall in order to have math circles in all of the Corvallis public schools.

“The main benefit for students is that they get a chance to see mathematics that is typically not found in the standard school curriculum, and they get extra mental stimulation/exercise,” said graduate student Hsaing Thum.

“We also seek to build understanding of these concepts by getting the students to come up with and provide explanations for their answers,” he said. “These skills easily extend to other areas where they need to be clear with their thinking.”

The most important aspect of the circles is the camaraderie, Gibson said. The groups do more than solve problems together. They talk about how the problems have similarities and differences as well as the solutions.

"We try to dig a little deeper, get more abstract to give them a hint on how to approach the harder problems," he said. "This type of problem solving is just more fun in a group.”

Thum said he wants to share his excitement for mathematics. “Looking back, as a kid and teen I failed to appreciate many aspects of the math clubs I had while growing up,” he said.

Gibson said he never failed to appreciate his early math education. His fourth-grade teacher gave him extra worksheets so he could play with numbers while others labored over 9x7.

"From that time on, I knew I would be a math teacher,” said Gibson, adding he hopes that feeling is contagious.

Research across disciplines

At the showcase, Wei Scholars presented their research across chemistry, mathematics, microbiology and statistics, with projects examining disease at the molecular level and modeling health and environmental systems at scale.

Presentations included:

• Paint: A potential source of PFAS in air and urban runoff
  Mitchell Kim-Fu, chemistry, fifth-year Ph.D.
• A clustering method for functional data
  Xinyu “Erica” Li, statistics, second-year Ph.D.
• Investigating lipid alterations in Alzheimer’s disease using MALDI mass spectrometry imaging
  Phoebe Lee, chemistry and mathematics, fourth-year B.S.
• How well can we identify spatial patterns in gene expression within cell types?
  Weiqi “Grace” Li, statistics, second-year M.S.
• Exploring the myxozoan sensing and signaling mechanism
  Laila Brubaker, microbiology, fourth-year M.S.
• Introduction to the volume conjecture for knots
  Hsiang Thum, mathematics, fourth-year Ph.D.
• An introduction to persistent homology transform
  Zejing Wang, mathematics, second-year Ph.D.
• Measuring intrinsic vaccine protection across time and space
  Zhuoya “Joya” He, statistics, fourth-year Ph.D.
• Glowing from invisible: Photon upconversion and its applications
  Mingcan Huang, chemistry, first-year Ph.D.
• Making cheaper batteries by letting salts store energy
  Ziang Jiang, chemistry, second-year Ph.D.
• Application of statistics in social science
  Jingtian Yu, chemistry, fifth-year Ph.D.

Additional Wei Scholars attended the showcase to support their peers, reflecting the strong sense of community within the program.

A community of scholars

For many students, the impact of the Wei Scholarship extends well beyond financial support.

“The Wei Scholarship has been instrumental in my graduate career by reducing financial stress and allowing me to focus on my academics,” said Mitchell Kim-Fu, a Ph.D. student in chemistry. “It has provided me with access to a network among the scholars and trustees. I’m impressed by the Wei Board of Trustee’s commitment to us because they foster a supportive and engaged relationship.”

Scholars also pointed to the relationships built through the program — with one another and with the foundation’s trustees.

“Their belief that we can contribute work that makes a meaningful impact on the world is especially inspiring,” said Ziang Jiang, a Ph.D. student in chemistry.

“I value the Wei Scholarship’s impact on my undergraduate career with gratitude and appreciation. This scholarship greatly supports my studies at OSU and inspires me to pursue graduate school. The Board made sure to connect with each of the scholars individually and showed interest in our research and academics,” said Phoebe Lee, a fourth-year student in a dual-degree bachelor’s program in mathematics and chemistry.

Others described the sense of connection and continuity that has developed around the program.

“The Wei Board has been nothing but kind to me and I sense that we are all immensely appreciative. I really like the annual dinner and appreciate them taking the time to come out to visit the scholars,” said Hsiang Thum, a fourth-year Ph.D. student in mathematics.

“It reminds me that there are people who truly believe in advancing science and supporting the next generation of researchers, and I feel very grateful and honored to be a Wei scholar. What stands out most to me is how genuine and caring the Trustees are. They travel from the East Coast each year to spend time with us, listen to our research and build personal connections that create a strong sense of support and belonging,” said Zhuoya He, a fourth-year Ph.D. student in statistics.

“Research helps drive a field forward, and it’s really at the forefront of giving better patient care or improving medications,” she said. “The Honors College really helped give me opportunities and gave me a structure because I knew we had to do a thesis.”

Karlapati ended up in Alicia Vrailas-Mortimer's lab, a fly lab that focuses on Alzheimer’s research. This became the cornerstone of her thesis, which examines different mutations that can accelerate the development of Alzheimer’s in flies and lead to neuron death.

When science students reach out to faculty, she said, being in honors signals commitment.

“Professors know you have to do your thesis and you’re willing to put in that extra mile,” she said.

For students eyeing medical, dental or graduate school, the thesis shows a level of scholarly ability that stands out. Every honors thesis is published on OSU’s open-access ScholarArchive, meaning each undergraduate has contributed to a global body of knowledge.

“It is a pathway that sets them apart… they’re making their contribution available to the entire world,” said Honors College Dean Toni Doolen.

A unique honors framework

Unlike many universities where honors is a transcript note or participation program, OSU stands apart as one of the only institutions in the country where honors is its own degree.

Students graduate with an Honors Baccalaureate degree, which is simultaneously conferred with their major. A biochemistry major, for example, graduates with an Honors Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry, a title that signals not just engagement in honors coursework, but academic rigor backed by measurable learning outcomes attached to the honors coursework.

“Our program isn’t just about participation or just taking honors sections of classes that you might normally take a non-honors section of. We have learning outcomes specific to the Honors College, including scholarly inquiry and engaged inquiry,” Doolen emphasized.

The scholarly inquiry learning outcome is fulfilled primarily through students doing independent research or scholarly work under the advisement of a faculty member and a committee that culminates in their honors thesis.

“This helps them grow their writing and oral communication skills. For many students, it also gives them a chance to do a really deep dive into what it looks like to be a scholar and to make a contribution to a body of knowledge,” Doolen said.

The engaged inquiry learning outcome coincides with the Honors College’s belief that students need to be able to communicate outside of their area of expertise. All students are required to complete unique classes to the Honors College called seminars. These courses offer students the opportunity to explore cross-disciplinary spaces that they might not otherwise be comfortable in. Seminars are taught pass or no pass so there is no risk to a student’s GPA.

Karlapati said those courses broadened her academic world.

“They give you an opportunity to learn about subjects in a different way,” she said. “They offer a low-stress environment to learn more and they’re also really fun.”

She took classes on leadership, astronomy, fashion and even a course built around board games that examined the history of finance.

For science students accustomed to lab reports and problem sets, that variety is often refreshing and useful.

Building relationships in a big university

Many students said one of the strongest Honors College benefits is the highly engaged class environment, especially early on in demanding science sequences like chemistry, biology and genetics.

Courcelle said this makes first-year classes less daunting.

“The core honors classes were a lot smaller,” she said. “It made a big difference when I was applying to outside opportunities my first year …. professors knew me well.”

Karlapati agreed. “Especially if you’re just starting out, it can be an easier path to get the help you need,” she said. “It’s a really big help to have that personalized attention.”

Dean Doolen emphasized that while some honors courses are small, others are intentionally large, but use an “engaged pedagogy” marked by interaction, discussion and experiential learning.

Another benefit is community-building opportunities outside the classroom.

Karlapati lived in West Hall, parton of the honors living and learning community, and she said the friendships she made there shaped her entire OSU experience.

“I have suitemates who are going to be my lifelong friends,” she said. “Most of them are the ones going to class with you…it’s great to go into the study room and you’re seeing all your classmates.”

The SLUG — the Honors College student learning space on the Corvallis campus — is another space that supports honors students. "SLUG" stands for Students Learning UnderGround and dates back to the Honors College's early days in Strand Agricultural Hall, when the student learning space was in the basement.

“It’s a great study spot, and the best part is the food,” Karlapati said. “There’s always a meal in there you can take whenever you need.” The Honors College supports students through its Forgot Your Lunch program, which provides food in the SLUG for anyone who forgot their meal or needs a little extra help.

The Honors College provides community for students who might otherwise feel overwhelmed.

“OSU is a big place now,” Dean Doolen said. “For a lot of students, the Honors College is a way of creating a smaller community of like-minded folks.”

A good fit for curious, driven scientists

Both Courcelle and Karlapati say the benefits of honors stack up, academically, personally and professionally.

The college becomes not just an academic distinction, but a launchpad. A hub for friends, mentors, engagement in research and personal and professional growth. A smaller, tighter world inside OSU’s expansive scientific ecosystem.

And for students like Courcelle and Karlalpati, it’s hard to imagine their scientific journey without it.

How he got involved with undergraduate research

Luikart’s passion for math didn’t begin in a classroom. In eighth grade, after transferring schools and being placed in the wrong math track, he found himself catching up over winter break with a thick packet of make-up work. He was unmotivated — until his father brought him along to work and left him with nothing else to do but finish the assignments.

“Through that experience, I formed a greater appreciation for it and fell in love with math,” he said. “I found out how fun it can be especially when you have a higher level of understanding.”

By high school, he was even more enthusiastic about math. And once he discovered he could make a career out of it, he was sold.

Raised between Oregon and New Hampshire, Luikart chose Oregon State in part for in-state tuition and its strong research focus. He capitalized on this strength and completed two major research projects, one on campus and the other as a part of an NSF funded summer research opportunity.

Asking his favorite professor if he could do research with him snowballed into his Honors thesis project and a mentor for life.

Luikart approached assistant professor Nick Marshall, who is interested in mathematics problems that involve interactions between analysis, geometry and probability, especially such problems motivated by applications to data science.

“He is a fantastic teacher, and past that, a great research mentor. He’s given me a lot of advice, and I don’t know where I would be without it,” Luikart said.

Together with Marshall and a graduate student, Luikart co-authored a paper published in the SIAM Journal On Matrix Analysis and Applications. Their work focused on improving a numerical algorithm, relevant to fields like medical imaging and computer tomography (CT, also known as CAT scans), by adding a method known as “momentum” to speed the algorithm.

“We need algorithms that can quickly solve these linear systems of equations. We added a term that incorporates past movement of the algorithm so it can speed up,” he said.

Equipped with knowledge from multiple terms working with Marshall, Luikart applied for multiple REUs (competitive summer National Science Foundation Research Experience for Undergraduates programs), covering all sides of mathematics research.

He was accepted and spent three months in Illinois working on mathematical biology at Northwestern University.

His research mentor was studying circannual rhythms, a biological rhythm that happens annually in different species like birds or bears. While many of the models assume this behavior is intrinsic and doesn’t take into account environmental influences, his mentor theorized differently.

Luikart worked on the early development of a new mathematical model that incorporates external factors like temperature or duration of daylight.

“I improved my independent problem solving and learned how mathematical modeling works. I did most of it on my own and it was interesting because I could mathematically model the same biological observation in different ways,” he said.

Undergraduate research has not been the only way Luikart has gotten involved on campus.

He joined the Math Club as a first-year student and became president in his senior year, helping revive the organization after it dwindled during the pandemic.

“It has been a huge part of my time here,” he said.

Today, the club hosts weekly meetings and game nights for all students who love math or are interested in it. Luikart’s energy and passion for connecting with students led to him becoming a resident assistant in the dormitories for three years.

Studying abroad

Second to meeting Nick Marshall, studying abroad was a top transformative experience for Luikart. Similar to knowing he wanted a Ph.D., studying abroad was a no-brainer. Travel has been a huge part of his life, with his mother taking him to a new country almost every year since he was a young child. At last count, he has been to about 20 countries.

Working with OSU Go, he was able to tailor his experience and enroll in Lancaster University in the United Kingdom. Often ranked in the top 15 mathematics programs in the UK, Lancaster fit everything he was looking for.

His favorite detail was one he almost didn’t notice. On an evening walk home, he noticed covered walkways along campus buildings, designed to shelter from frequent rain. Between the supporting pillars were carefully tended flower planters. Careful not to damage them, gardeners were taking each planter down to water. This small attention to detail left a lasting impression.

“I really liked the university, and the campus turned out to be the biggest highlight for me. It is incredibly beautiful. I was already loving the campus, but as I was nearing the end of my time there, I started to take more time to appreciate things. I could go on and on,” he said.

A thirst for more math

This July, Luikart will head to Charlottesville to begin his Ph.D. at the University of Virginia. While professorship remains his goal, the draw of graduate school goes further than fulfilling a career path.

“Even if I don’t end up becoming a professor, having that further mathematical understanding is something I desire. Right now, I know just the tip of the iceberg,” he said.

For Luikart, math is a subject to explore. And thanks to the community, opportunities and mentorship he found at Oregon State, he’s ready for whatever comes next.

"When I started to take more physics classes, I thought, 'Wow, this physics stuff is really cool,' and it just clicked,” Takach said. One thing led to another, his passion grew and he pivoted entirely.

"Not to say that math isn’t beautiful, but I think that applying math to something real is what is most important."

Takach is graduating this summer with a double major in physics and mathematics. "The coolest thing about the math department is how flexible it is. And in the physics department, everyone's really friendly and there's lots of interaction between students," he said.

In the fall, Takach is moving forward with a Ph.D. program at University of California, Berkeley, focusing on particle physics and phenomenology. This involves looking for things that can be observed and may not be obvious experimentally. Instead of testing a hypothesis, phenomenologists choose a mathematical theory and try to “tease out” observations. After they decide what the observable effects are, they tell experimentalists to go looking for them in real life applications.

By chance, physics meets education technology

Takach found a lot of faculty support that allowed him to make an impact early on in his academic career. In his first year, one of his main advisors, Associate Department Head David Craig became his go-to resource for knowledge.

“I did the naive freshman thing and went to Craig because he was one of the resident theoretical physicists here. He directed me to a bunch of stuff to study in my free time and what books to read. He also motivated me to start learning on my own, and helped me learn how to attack those high-level concepts early without waiting to be in a class.”

Takach’s journey didn’t stop there. Last summer, he landed an internship at University of California, Davis, where he gained experience working with computational physics and quantum field theories in the realm of particle physics.

At Oregon State, he worked on campus as a peer advisor for the Science Success Center and as a learning assistant for the Techniques of Theoretical Mechanics course in the physics department.

His passion blossomed when he learned how to utilize the power of Python, a computer programming language, to create educational videos about high-level physics concepts and make the content more accessible to students who haven’t learned it.

“Getting an early start and giving kids the opportunities to learn more as early as they can is so important. It becomes second-nature if they start early enough,” he said.

Inspired by YouTuber 3Blue1Brown, who made animated mathematics content, Takach created his own video to help more students have access to an engaging, easier-to-grasp learning experience. His goal was to teach about an advanced mathematics topic: curl.

In vector mathematics, curl is a concept that involves measuring the rotational or swirling behavior of a vector field. A vector is a direction with a specified measurement, such as how fast a golf ball moves forward when hit with a golf club. Imagine a bunch of arrows pointing in the direction that the ball is moving – the longer the arrows, the stronger the force in that direction.

“There are tons of people online that make these kinds of videos. Making this content accessible to younger people is essential because the amount of science you need to know in order to advance in a field is very daunting,” Takach said.

He sent his video to Physics Professor Emeritus Corinne Manogue, the leader behind the Paradigms in Physics project funded by the National Science Foundation. This physics education project led to the creation of 19 new physics courses and focused on shifting the curricula from traditional lectures to active engagement for students at Oregon State.

She hired Takach to make more educational videos that were aligned with the physics curriculum, including quantum mechanics. The videos were intended to improve the learning experience for future physics students.

“The most concrete thing that I want to have an impact on is teaching. I love sharing the experience of learning something for the first time. It happens so frequently – it's the weirdest experience and when you share that with someone, It’s motivating, fulfilling and fun,” he said.

Physics Associate Professor Elizabeth Gire also had a positive influence on his academic career. After she taught one of his first upper-division physics courses, he left feeling inspired. "She really, really cares about the students and how much everyone's learning. I think that rubbed off on me. The way she goes about teaching and encouraging people to work together is definitely something to look up to and had a big impression on me.”

Looking back, one of Takach’s favorite memories at Oregon State is living with his friends for three years. "Two of my best friends from high school are still my roommates now. They’ve been a great support system.”

During his free time, Joey loves to dive into music and plays several instruments, including guitar, bass, viola and violin. When the sun comes out, he enjoys hiking, backpacking and traveling.

After completing his Ph.D. in California, Takach dreams of becoming a physics professor. “Learning and teaching for as long as possible is the most ideal for me. I need the connection to what is actually real. Not to say that math isn’t beautiful, but I think that applying math to something real is what is most important.”

His road to graduation started with his father.

"I was very good at math when I was a kid, and my dad tried to hone in on that," he said. "He always told me how when he learned math, he memorized formulas and that got him through math even when he didn't always understand it."

Even if math didn’t rise to the level of a passion quite yet in Holzschuh's young life, he spent a lot of time crunching numbers. "I would always spend hours learning to understand the math I was doing," he said.

All that time paid off when he arrived at Cleveland High School. "I quickly picked up on math because I had such a strong foundation that I could easily build on," he said.

"That led to being very good at math and very good at physics," he added. "I didn't pursue physics because there are just a couple of concepts I really didn't understand, like when I started learning about Feynman diagrams."

Feynman diagrams are pictorial representations of mathematical expressions describing the behavior and interaction of subatomic particles.

Physicist Richard Feynman used wavy lines to represent photons. In physics as well as mathematics, a wave is a propagating dynamic disturbance of one or more quantities. "Waves are pretty weird," Holzschuh said. "Waves always tripped me up, so I decided to focus on math."

Oregon State was a fairly straight-forward choice for college, he said. Other colleges and universities in Oregon don't offer as many classes in statistics, and Holzschuh also wanted to stay close to home.

"I came to Oregon State mostly because I'm from Portland, and it was pretty easy," he said. "I wasn't moving too far, and I still had a little bit of freedom. I also knew a lot of people here, so it would be an easy transition into college."

Once in Corvallis, Holzschuh said he was impressed with the university's world-class faculty, and his love of math flourished.

"I love the theory behind math," he said. "It's super interesting to me how you predict outcomes."

He added he also loves how math is so unambiguous.

"I like how math has one answer," he said. "When you're doing calculus, there's one answer. Now that I'm in more proof-based analysis level math, I like how you go from Point A to Point B, and there are different ways to go, but you're always going to get to Point B."

His other academic passion is not known for its lack of ambiguity.

"Math and science were my big subjects in high school, but I also had a small interest in philosophy," Holzschuh said. "I really do still love philosophy."

He just doesn't have a lot of time to hang out with Plato, Descartes and their 21st-century counterparts as a mathematics major.

"Because I spend most of my time studying math, I don't have the reading comprehension level to truly understand a lot of the current philosophy papers," he said. "They're just so heavy and dense."

Still, he has friends ready to help. "One of my best friends is a philosophy major in Belgium, and he will talk to me about philosophy for hours," he said. "I really love it."

"Being able to go on the scheduling website and just take a bunch of math classes, it makes me pretty happy."

Being a math major has not kept him socially isolated, he added.

"I've met so many different people from so many different majors," Holzschuh said. "One of my best friends is a mechanical engineer. My two roommates are botany and English majors."

Students recognized for expertise in certain subjects in high school are often humbled when they arrive at college and are no longer the big fish in a small pond.

Even if he was no longer one of a handful of math stars, Holzschuh said he found coming to the mathematics community at Oregon State exhilarating.

"I actually liked it," he said. "For one, college allowed me take the classes I wanted to take. I went from high school, where I took one math class a year and seven other random classes, to where I'm taking 20 hours of math and statistics this semester."

He added, "Being able to go on the scheduling website and just take a bunch of math classes, it makes me pretty happy."

Undergraduate students usually spend much of their freshman and sophomore years taking required lower-division classes, regardless of their majors.

"Once you get past your second year in mathematics, it really opens up," Holzschuh said. "I came in a year ahead on my math track, so once I got to my second year, I could take linear algebra, and once you've taken that, basically everything opens up. You can pretty much take any math class in any field."

He has taken such general elective classes as differential equations, complex variables ("which is really interesting"), math models and math biology.

"I never thought I would take anything related to biology because I hated biology in high school, but that was an interesting class," Holzschuh said.

After graduation, he intends to move from Corvallis in August to start graduate school at Boston University.

"I selected Boston University because it's on the East Coast," he said. "I really want to go there, especially because of math and finance. The East Coast is a great place to be for that. Also, Boston seems beautiful, and it's close to New York."

After grad school, Holzschuh said he hopes to remain on the East Coast and pursue his love of numbers as a quantitative analyst -- designing, developing and implementing algorithms and mathematical or statistical models to solve complex financial problems.

"It's a very challenging career path, and I really like being challenged," he said.

John Musgrove, ‘20, and Tyler Schimleck, ‘21, heard about the theorem in De Leenheer’s Vector Calculus 2 course and approached him after class. He enthusiastically brought them on board what turned into a five-year project.

“For me, it was my first time jumping into real mathematical literature. Reading papers by other mathematicians working on the same problem and diving into their research was super exciting for me,” Musgrove said.

Having access to undergraduate research helped both of them successfully pursue a postgraduate degree.

Musgrove graduated from Columbia University with his MS in Operations Research and Schimleck is currently a graduate student at UC Santa Barbara in the Department of Mathematics. Schimleck is interested in differential geometry and mathematical physics.

“It can be so scary at first if you try to read mathematical literature. There is a huge gap between a lot of high-level research and what you learn in undergrad,” Schimleck said. “Doing undergraduate research was a massive confidence boost that helps me say, ‘No, it’s okay, I can do this. I may not understand it at first but eventually, I’ll figure it out and it’ll be okay.’”

Working with a faculty member can be equally terrifying but Musgrove and Schimleck said De Lehneer helped every step of the way.

“One of my favorite things about working with Patrick, would be sitting there in the room and we’re staring at equations on the blackboard in silence for a few minutes and then we will have an “Aha” moment and Patrick will actually say “Aha” and go run to the blackboard with the solution,” Musgrove said. “It's labor. Math doesn’t look appetizing but once you are in it, the energy and emotions sustain the whole thing.”

He said that in a typical undergraduate classroom, students don’t get to experience facing a wall because everything is set up with an answer already.

“That’s the difference with doing research, there is nobody who will tell you the answer. You just have to keep looking at it and thinking about it. There are no shortcuts,” he said.

De Leenheer said it feels like serendipity that a question he had as a young adult, he was able to answer years later.

“I got to know two guys here in class and they showed excitement and they had the dedication, they never quit. Even today I am still thinking about it and it baffles me when I talk to people about this result. All together it was very rewarding,” he said.

Biophysics remains a relatively new branch that tries approaching biology through a less traditional lens. As Bailey-Darland puts it, there is an innate difficulty to the study of biology because of its complexity. Even the most basic level of life, a cell, bursts with intricate processes and structures. Because of this, applying the methods of physics to biology can help dissect it into more palatable pieces.

“Most of physics is looking at a really simple system and understanding it completely, like seeing what happens if a block slides down a ramp, and building on that to more complicated things,” he explained. “So to me, it seems like biophysics is trying to start saying, ‘How can we look at simplified systems in biology and understand them?’”

In addition to his passion for physics, Bailey-Darland would discover another field that held his interest. In fact, he found two.

Simple and elegant

Deciding on a major is a notoriously daunting task, but deciding on a second major may be even more so.

This was the challenge Bailey-Darland found himself faced with. Having skipped general chemistry thanks to credits he earned in high school, he began the organic chemistry sequence in his first year. This set him on an accelerated path toward getting all of the chemistry credits he needed, and he realized he would be able to have an additional major in chemistry if he took a few more courses. Already enjoying the subject, he went through with it and became a double-major.

Yet, a different topic called to him more.

Amidst his several chemistry lectures and laboratories, he felt that he was being pulled away from the mathematics classes he loved. Part of his initial reasoning in getting a chemistry major was that he would still have time outside of it to dedicate to mathematics. When that was no longer the case, he switched his second major for one in the subject he was more passionate about.

“Much of math, at least to me, can be simple and elegant in a lot of ways.”

“Math is another framework to look at different ideas,” he said. “Much of math, at least to me, can be simple and elegant in a lot of ways. There’s a lot of aspects of it that are translatable to other things, and it’s a way to make talking about certain ideas very rigorous and logical.”

The chemistry classes he took were not in vain, however. He continued to get a minor in the subject and even found a new opportunity through his courses. While in physical chemistry his sophomore year he met Professor Chong Fang, whose ultrafast spectroscopy laboratory not only adds to the field of chemistry but also those of physics, biology and bioengineering, among others. Fang discussed his research briefly in the class, and Bailey-Darland decided to approach him about it during his office hours.

As a physics major in need of an advisor for his required thesis, Bailey-Darland also took the opportunity to ask the professor to help guide him through his project. With that, he became not only a double-major but also a member of two separate research groups pursuing science as an interdisciplinary researcher. What he couldn’t have expected from any of these experiences would be a senior year spent programming.

The tools for the job

Bailey-Darland never took a programming class in high school. The extent of his experience came from free tutorials online, ones where he would compute mathematics problems with large datasets using relatively simple programming. So it became ironic that the culminating thesis for his physics major relied entirely on the skill.

Moving back and forth between his two research groups, he realized that they both encountered a similar problem in different contexts called “sloppy models.” In a lab, models can be used to illustrate data gathered throughout an experiment. Fitting the models allows researchers to analyze and predict data, and the better the fit, the more accurate the analysis. But with sloppy models, the data can become considerably harder to study.

“Basically you can move around the parameters of your model and still get a good fit,” Bailey-Darland explained. “That’s an inherent problem in this type of model compared to fitting a line, where it’s a lot easier to figure out the slope or the y-intercept.” In short, the flexibility of these models made them more inaccurate predictors of data and resulted in less concrete conclusions.

After deciding he would make fixing the problem his thesis, he came across a new challenge he hadn’t experienced before. “When you initially do research you’re given a project and don’t really have to think about whether it’s valid or not. If someone asks why you’re doing it, your advisor usually steps in and explains why it’s important,” he said. “But my thesis was the first time where I was the one who had to explain the importance to both of my advisors. That was a really good opportunity to grow.”

He had planned on using an already created Python library, a programming language, in order to conduct his work, but found that it wouldn’t function the way he needed it to. Not wanting to give up, he resolved to do something he had no intention of at the start of the project: create entirely new programming tools.

“I originally planned to not make anything new,” he said. “I started by assuming I’d use someone else’s work, but at a point I realized I could just make it myself. That ended up happening for all of the stages of this process.”

The work wound up being so significant that, despite again not planning for it, Bailey-Darland received the sole Physics Undergraduate Thesis award for his research.

“I wasn’t aiming for the award, but I definitely put a lot of work into it,” he said. The experience illustrated a vital idea for him. “Some of the most fun research projects I’ve worked on have been when I had an idea and wasn’t sure if it was good or not. If you’re interested in it, it’s worth pursuing.”

“That’s kind of how it was with OSU — there are lots of opportunities to do interesting things if you’re looking for them. I’m hoping to do that again; show up and do stuff that seems interesting to me.”

Now at the end of his time at Oregon State, he will continue doing interdisciplinary work with a biophysics research group at Cornell University, much like his advisor Kevin Brown. While he may not have specific goals laid out for himself, he enjoys having room to grow. “That’s kind of how it was with OSU — there are lots of opportunities to do interesting things if you’re looking for them. I’m hoping to do that again; show up and do stuff that seems interesting to me.”

To read more about being a physics major, visit their department website here.

Building new communities with math

Sometimes, student-athletes struggle with maintaining satisfactory grades while trying to maintain a busy schedule, so Oregon State Athletics has a special tutoring program designed for them. As a tutor, she got these students back on track when they struggled with their college courses.

After a year, she switched to the Supplemental Instruction (SI) program. The program is a free resource that students at Oregon State utilize to learn key concepts in a group environment. Leaders come prepared with a lesson plan full of practice problems and interactive activities and implemented them in peer-led, group study tables.

This was her chance to practice shaking up the curriculum. Collins designed a BINGO activity that aided students with reviewing vocabulary. She also put together problem sets that they solved together at the study table. This way, she was able to not only host student-led lessons but encourage collaboration.

While an employee, she started chatting about what she wanted to research for her honors thesis with SI Coordinator ​​Chris Gasser. He acted as a mentor by encouraging Collins to be resilient while taking tough academic courses. Before long, she stumbled upon her honors topic of choice - analyzing curriculum implementation.

Uncovering how calculus is taught

At the end of her third year, Collins devoted the majority of her time to developing her honors thesis with Oregon State Mathematics Instructor Elizabeth Jones. Collins visited different sections of MTH 252 Integral Calculus at Oregon State and recorded observations.

She sat with the students and jotted down different teaching strategies she saw implemented by a variety of instructors. Using her observations, she developed a framework for analysis in order to find the most effective ways to continue implementing the calculus curriculum in college-level courses.

She enjoyed chatting with Jones about the different classroom, assessment, design and course support strategies she chose to analyze. But occasionally, their math education preferences diverged.

While talking about trigonometry substitution, they discussed different mathematical notations and the confusion that comes with non-standard notations. Variables are written with alphabetical characters. For instance, pertaining to trigonometric substitution, Collins prefers to use a ‘u’ whereas Jones prefers to use an ‘x’.

Sometimes, the same symbol can have different meanings in various areas of math. For example, absolute value bars, IVI, can denote other operations including vector magnitude, IVI. It’s a subtle detail, but can have a major impact on how variables are communicated to the students.

"I hope that by going into teaching, I can help people get through a typically difficult subject and make it more enjoyable for them."

Now that her first thesis is complete, Collins wants to put what she learned into practice by teaching in a college setting that is approachable for students. When students walk into her future office, she wants to address the little questions and not have students be hesitant to ask a question that is ‘too simple’ to answer.

“I get really excited when I am helping someone and can see them putting the pieces together in their head. When they reach the final answer in a ‘lightbulb moment,’ they get super excited,” she said. “I don’t just want to lecture students. I want to teach them how to approach math and build confidence in their skills.”

Being able to learn how to be the teacher she wants to be came at a cost. Luckily, when her academic experience got a little bumpy, she wasn’t alone.

Persevering in the face of failure

For Collins, being a Beaver at Oregon State came with the pressure to succeed. “The biggest challenge I've had growing up through school was that I put a lot of academic pressure on myself,” she said.

After her official advisor left the university, she met Oregon State Mathematics Professor Nathan Gibson who became her advisor, professor and mentor. He taught MTH 323 Mathematical Modeling, which turned out to be a tough class for Collins. She wrote a 10-page report talking about the errors that happen when modeling basic electrical circuits and how the different components differed from each other.

“I ended up using a little bit of electrical engineering from that one class I took in my first year. I’m pretty sure my simulation failed, but I still got an A on the paper,” she said. It takes encouragement to agree to finish a difficult course, especially when it comes to learning how to use differential equation systems in the real world. This was the type of mentorship Gibson provided when Collins needed it most. Now, she can apply what she learned in a classroom setting.

“A lot of people are told they aren’t a math person,” she said. “I totally agree that math is not something many people want to study, but I really enjoy it and the problem-solving aspect of it. I hope that by going into teaching, I can help people get through a typically difficult subject and make it more enjoyable for them.”

Collins is now able to teach others in a way she wishes she was taught – and it all started with math homework at the dinner table.