News: page 14

Jean-Pierre Kassegne graduated from CCNY in 2017 with a B.A. in pure mathematics. He is now working as an actuary with MetLife!

Hear about it from Jean-Pierre himself!

My name is Jean-Pierre Kodjo Kassegne and I completed my bachelor’s degree in Pure Mathematics from the City College of New York in 2017. I am currently working for MetLife as an actuary. I started my actuarial career right after graduation from the CCNY. During my time at CCNY, I knew what I wanted to do with my degree in mathematics which is becoming an actuary. Therefore, I took advantage of all the great resources provided by the math department that prepared me for my career.

In the summers of 2016 and 2017, I did the Rich Summer Internship with Prof. Alice Medvedev and Prof. Shirshendu Chatterjee where I picked up tremendous programming skills and learned how to become a careful thinker through rigorous proofs. The skills I acquired through the internships prepared me so well for my career.

With a major in Pure Math, we had a lot of elective courses. So, I used this opportunity to take classes in probability, statistics, financial mathematics, and programming. As a result, I started taking actuarial exams while I was at CCNY. I ended up passing the first three exams before graduation, which was a big factor in finding a job after graduation.

At MetLife, my daily work involves using the analytical and quantitative skills I developed from the CCNY. If I must redo it all over again, I won’t hesitate to choose the City College of New York. I am grateful for all the help I received during my time there. I want to take this opportunity to thank my friend Djiby Top, Prof. Christian Wolf, Prof. Alice Medvedev, Prof. Shirshendu Chatterjee, Prof. Joseph Bak, Prof. Jay Jorgenson and many others for all the support and advice. A special thanks to Jason Redman who is always available for guidance. I learned about internships and scholarship opportunities through him. To any CCNY math student who wants to become an actuary, do not hesitate to reach out via LinkedIn.

The Department of Mathematics marks with profound sadness the passing of Professor Emeritus Stanley Kaplan and Professor Emeritus Raymond Hoobler on March 23 and April 29, respectively. Besides being beloved members of our department, they were also on the faculty of the CUNY Graduate Center Mathematics Program.

The orbituary for Professor Kaplan

An article written about Professor Hoobler

Abdullah Khan is a double major in Physics and Mathematics at CCNY. He is also the recipient of the Dr. Barnett and Jean Hollander Rich 2020 Summer Internship where he worked with Prof. Tamara Kucherenko.

Hear more about it from Abdullah himself!

My name is Abdullah Khan and I interned for Professor Tamara Kucherenko during this past summer. The duration of my work consisted of characterizing the continuity class of a roof function which is part of Prof. Kucherenko's first explicit example of suspension flows with non-unique measures of maximal entropy in her joint paper. Additionally, I sought to find new roof functions in more restrictive classes of continuity supporting the same types of suspension flows. These tasks involved understanding and applying notions from analysis on metric spaces and appropriately utilizing mathematical results from literature to construct different lemmas and their proofs.

Immersing myself in research with Prof. Kucherenko made my summer much brighter - honing my creativity, constructing rigorous proofs and becoming a careful thinker has been such a rewarding experience. With the Professor's kind and friendly encouragement, I'm more excited about research and my major than ever before.

My sincere thanks to my parents - Fouzia and Moin - for their continued support and love, to my partner, Searra, for always being there for me, and to her parents - Corrine and Frank - for generously supporting me in every way they could.

Brenda Delamonica is a student in the Master of Science (M.S.) program in Mathematics at CCNY. She is also the recipient of the Dr. Barnett and Jean Hollander Rich 2020 Summer Internship where she worked with Michael Shub.

Hear more about it from Brenda herself!

My name is Brenda Delamonica and I worked with Professor Shub to study how concepts in dynamical systems apply to models of metastatic cell behavior. What I enjoyed the most was seeing how these mathematical concepts apply to real world problems and questions and in particular, I liked collaborating and learning from others in various fields such as biologists at Stonybrook, and computer scientists at the University of Michigan. I've always enjoyed math, it's fun to get lost in problems and I like discovering various applications of math in other fields.

This Fall, I will start my Ph.D in Physics at the University of Texas at Austin. I was admitted to the City College of New York in 2015 with the goal to pursue physics for my bachelor’s degree. When I was a sophomore, I declared my major to be physics but I felt unsatisfied to leave mathematics. A few days later, I declared my second major to be math with a concentration in pure mathematics. Pursuing a double major in physics and mathematics at CCNY opened the door for me to meet with a lot of people from whom I have learned a lot in and outside of academia.

I want to thank my research supervisor, Professor Alexios Polychronakos, for giving me the opportunity to perform my honors thesis under his invaluable guidance. He has taught me how to be resilient and how to overcome frustration. His sincerity, kindness, and love for physics have inspired me. Also, thanks to Professor Parameswaran Nair for giving me the chance to conduct two independent studies over the topic of particle physics and for the invaluable discussions I had with him, which opened a new door of interest to me in physics.

I would also like to thank Professor Christian Wolf from the Mathematics Department for showing me the beauty of mathematics and for his support in graduate school applications. His enthusiasm and motivation towards mathematics have inspired me. I am thankful for all the support and guidance he had offered me in these past two years.

I would be a remiss if I didn’t mention Professor Timothy Boyer who has been my role model as an amazing instructor. I am deeply grateful to have learned from him how to be an advocate for one’s opinion in science even if it is against the flow. I also want to thank Dr. James Hedberg, Professor Joel Gersten, Professor Alexander Punnose and Professor Joseph Bak for their council and advice throughout the past 5 years.

I also want to thank my cohort in the physics and the math department for being who they are. I honored to be one of them, as they were very encouraging, loving, and wonderful colleagues in every meaning of the word.

I am grateful for the people who gave me opportunities, and I regret that I couldn’t thank each one of them as I have intended to do so. Lastly and above everything, I want to thank god for the love, support and guidance he has given me to pursue this academic path against all odds set before me. And also for giving me the opportunity to meet those wonderful people and be a part of the CCNY community, which has offered me more than what I have dreamed of as an immigrant wishing to study physics. I appreciate every single moment I was able to go to school and be part of such a wonderful community. With that said, I am looking forward to joining UT Austin’s community and I am excited to see what UT Austin is holding for me.