Stony Brook RTG in Geometry

Professional Development Seminar

The professional development seminar is a seminar for advanced (= third year and above) graduate students and postdocs. It focuses on ALL issues of professional development relevant to young mathematicians. Among the topics we may discuss: preparing application materials, career options outside academia, using TeX and TeX packages, mathematical writing, creating webpages, creating blogs, time management, preparing and giving research lectures, and general discussions about doing research. The organizers are Chris Bishop and Christian Schnell. On this page, you can find a collection of resources for the seminar.

Funding Opportunities in the Mathematical Sciences

Deadlines are current as of September 2022.

• NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program [Deadline October 21, 2022]
• NDSEG Graduate Fellowship. [Deadline October 31, 2022]
• NSF Mathematical Sciences Postdoctoral Research Fellowships. [Deadline October 19, 2022]
• NSF Individual Grants.
  • Algebra and Number Theory [Deadline October 14, 2022]
  • Analysis [Window September 16–30, 2022]
  • Applied Mathematics [Window November 1–15, 2022]
  • Combinatorics [Deadline September 27, 2022]
  • Computational Mathematics [Window November 16 – December 1, 2022]
  • Foundations [Deadline September 27, 2022]
  • Geometric Analysis [Deadline November 1, 2022]
  • Mathematical Biology [No deadline]
  • Probability [Window September 10–25, 2022]
  • Statistics [Window December 1–15, 2022]
  • Topology [Deadline November 1, 2022]
• NSF CAREER Grants. [Deadline July 26, 2023]
• AMS-Simons Travel Grants. [Next cycle February 1 to March 31, 2023]
• Simons Foundation Collaboration Grants for Mathematicians. [Reopens Fall 2022]

Mathematical Writing Resources

• Mathematical Writing by Donald Knuth. Available in print from the following webpage.
• How to Write Mathematics by N. E. Steenrod, P. R. Halmos, M. M. Schiffer, and J. A. Dieudonné.
  The essay by Halmos is particularly fun and is also available here from L'Enseignement Mathématique.
• A Primer of Mathematical Writing by Steven Krantz.
• Advice from Jonathan Shewchuk, UC Berkeley CS department: Three Sins of Authors and Giving an Academic Talk.
• YouTube link to Serre's fabulous video How to Write Mathematics Badly.
• Introduction to Beamer and TikZ: PDF and TEX

Early Career Section (Notices of the AMS)

• Introducing the Notices Early Career Section by Angela Gibney.
• Early Career Collection from the Notices.

Advice on Giving Research Talks

• Tips on giving talks by Jordan Ellenberg
• Talks are not the same as papers by Terence Tao
• Giving a talk by Bryna Kra
• How to talk mathematics by Paul Halmos, in Notices of the AMS (1974), 21:3, 155–8
• Technically Speaking from Denison University
• How to give a good 20-minute math talk by William T. Ross

Resources for Publishing Papers

• Top Journal MCQs in the MR citation database
• Backlog of Mathematics Research Journals in 2017, from the Notices of the AMS

Resources for Coding Exercises

• LeetCode
• HackerRank

Resources for Jobs at Startups

• AngelList

Resources in Professional Ethics in the Mathematical Sciences

• Ethical Guidelines of the AMS
• Code of Practice of the EMS
• Authorial Integrity in Scientific Publication by SIAM
• Professional Ethics: Taking the High Road by Dianne P. O'Leary

Job Application Websites

• AMS Data on the Profession
• MathJobs
• European Math Society Jobs Listing
• Employment Information in the Mathematical Sciences
• AMS Job Search Advice for New PhDs
• Finding a Postdoctoral Position in Mathematics by Lauren Williams
• What are your chances of finding an academic job? (using data from Stony Brook and from the 2017/18 Annual Survey)

Samples of Job Application Documents

• Writing a Teaching Philosophy Statement
• Jason Starr's CV (pdf, source, class option file). You need the class option file in order to compile the source.
• Christian Schnell's CV (pdf, source, bibliography, BibTeX source, style file). You need the style file and the bibliography to compile this.
• One of Jason Starr's old research statements (pdf, source, biblio database file).
• One of Christian Schnell's research statements (pdf, source).
• One of Jason Starr's old teaching statements (pdf, source).
• One of Christian Schnell's teaching statements (pdf, source).