Cultivating a Culture of Entrepreneurial Mindset and Undergraduate Research

Dr. Michael Coons

Research Interests:

  • Aperiodic Order 
  • Fractal Geometry
  • Number Theory

CURE-E Course: Analytic Geometry and Calculus (MATH 120)

Project Title: Application of calculus within students’ disciplines

As part of the course assessment, there will be a two-part assignment that aims to help the student understand how calculus is applied in the student’s discipline. In the first part of the assignment, the students will articulate problems/situations in their discipline to which calculus can be applied. In the second part, the students, in small groups (2-3), will produce a 2 page paper/report that will not only describe the problem in the context of their discipline from part 1, but will describe a solution including pertinent examples.

The purpose of this course is to introduce calculus via analytic geometry for future use in the students’ disciplines. The inclusion of the CURE-E project will increase student awareness of the necessity of mathematics—specifically, calculus---within the students’ disciplines, which hopefully leads to both better understanding/appreciation of mathematics and higher student performance in first-semester calculus.

Portrait of Dr. Michael Coons