Vincent Filardi & Marino Echavarria Accepted to Summer Programs

Hear about it from Vincent Filardi

This summer I have the opportunity to participate in an 8-week immersion in Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s Research Experiences for Undergraduates program with the machine learning team. My intention for attending this REU is to develop methods in Machine Learning based off techniques in Partial Differential Equations. The program is designed to provide a glimpse of the ways that advanced mathematics is used in the real world to solve complex problems. I will be working closely with a company representative to define the problem and develop solutions of immediate value to the company. The thought of our work to be used in decision making on an industrial scale excites me. I predict that these characteristics will prove themselves invaluable to my applications for Ph.D. programs.

Thank you to Professor Santoro and Professor Hanson for their kind endorsements. Special shout out to Professor Santoro, Professor Etemadpour and Professor Ramamurthy for their continual support in our research projects. I extend my gratitude to the NSF, CCNY Mathematics Department and City College Fellowships Program in their gracious financial support this summer.

To all my friends over the years at City College and Norwalk Community College: I am serious when I say I cherish the moments we have shared, without you this is all hard to imagine. The program starts on May 19th, and I will be returning on July 20th.

Hear about it from Marino Echavarria

This summer I will be going to Johns Hopkins University to do research in theoretical computer science as a part of their Leadership Alliance cohort. I chose to study mathematics because of my friend Vincent Filardi. I was a computer science major when I met Vincent in my discrete mathematics course. He asked me what my interest in computer science was and when I told him that I wanted to reason through and solve difficult problems and about how much I was enjoying the course he suggested that I should study mathematics. I was skeptical at first but soon realized that what I would find in theoretical computer science was very mathematical. I was just about done with the math courses my CS degree required and decided I would miss mathematics too much if I’d stopped, so I declared a double major by the end of the semester. I would like to pursue graduate study in either theoretical computer science or mathematics to the end of becoming an academic. I’ve loved the experiences I’ve had teaching and tutoring in the past. I’d also like to take up the torch from Professor Stanley Ocken’s efforts to improve mathematics education especially in communities like mine where most see mathematics with either disdain or apathy. The thought of doing that while doing research sounds very rewarding. I’d like to thank my family for nurturing my interests with as many books as I wanted, Vincent for brainwashing me, my friends for their support through much self-doubt, and all of my eccentric and enthusiastic math instructors over the years whose excitement about math kept me curious and whose support allowed me to persevere.

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