Duncan Chair and Professor of Mathematics Fumiko Futamura, along with artist Jiabao Li and art director Ron Berry of Fusebox, have been awarded a $150,000 grant to build a math playground in Austin through the Simons Foundation Triangle Program. Math Playground is an outdoor installation and accompanying exhibition that turns abstract mathematical ideas into playful, embodied, large-scale sculptures. Visitors can climb, slide, swing, and spin on custom sculptures whose forms embody complex math concepts. A Klein bottle slide creates a continuous looping path. A shape called a Boy’s surface becomes a twisting climbing net that flips orientation. The Lissajous swing set draws patterns in the sand through harmonic motion. A merry-go-round zoetrope animates models through rotation and repetition. Math Playground makes math fun and intuitive, inviting people to experience symmetry physically, in their bodies, by moving through shapes usually understood only in theory. For preliminary renderings, visit here. For the announcement, visit here.

Duncan Chair and Professor of Mathematics Fumiko Futamura was invited by the Mathematical Association of America SIGMAA – Undergraduate Research group to co-present a webinar with Dr. Elizabeth Reid at Marist University on designing manageable and meaningful undergraduate projects. She talked about her students’ innovative ideas for application projects in Linear Algebra and Geometry and how some of these have led to continued research beyond the semester, presentations at regional and national conferences, and in one case, an award-winning publication.

Duncan Chair and Professor of Mathematics Fumiko Futamura was invited by the Simons Foundation to be a math consultant to botanical gardens for their Math in Bloom program, part of the Infinite Sums initiative that seeks to make the beauty of mathematics accessible to a wide audience through programming initiated by non-mathematicians. Horticulturalists and directors from five botanical gardens around the country gathered at the San Antonio Botanical Garden to brainstorm ideas for a pi day (3/14), infinity day (8/8), and Fibonacci day (11/23) that will take place in 2026. More information is available here.

Three faculty and an alumna participated in the 2025 MathFest, a national meeting of the Mathematical Association of America (MAA) in Sacramento, CA from August 6–10. Professor and Duncan Chair of Mathematics Fumiko Futamura presented “Linear Algebra Class Projects to Research Projects.” Professor and Garey Chair of Mathematics Alison Marr presented “Trying, Flailing, Tweaking, Succeeding: A Grading Journey” and served on a Project NExT panel titled “Navigating the Shifting Tides of Academia in 2025.” Associate Professor of Mathematics Therese Shelton presented “Cholera Models with Pathogen Growth for Student Engagement in Undergraduate Differential Equations and Beyond.” She also co-organized the contributed paper session, “In the Real with Applications of Differential Equations for Learning,” jointly sponsored by SIMIODE and CODEE. Futamura, Marr, and Shelton also each provided professional service in monitoring MAA minicourses. Mathematics and computer science graduate Emma Kathryn Groves ’17 was a co-author on a presentation “Assigning Interconnected Projects in a Dynamical Systems Course.” She also co-organized the contributed paper session “From Theory to Practice – Applying Literature-Based Teaching Practices in the Real Classroom.” Dr. Groves achieved her Ph.D. in 2023 and is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mathematical Sciences at the United States Military Academy in West Point, NY.

Professor and Duncan Chair of Mathematics Fumiko Futamura presented a workshop on “Writing a Mathematical Art Manifesto” at the Bridges Math Art Conference in Eindhoven, Netherlands. Attended by artists, mathematicians, and those in between, the exercise prompted interesting discussions that explored the boundaries of what might be considered mathematical art, its reception in the math and art worlds, and its rich connection to feminine and indigenous arts: textiles, weaving, knots, crochet, tiling, quilting, basketmaking, etc.