This project supports the creation of four textbooks and four open-content computer lab manuals with supporting materials for a new upper-division undergraduate curriculum in Applied and Computational Mathematics (ACM) that will modernize the mathematics major and better integrate it with the broader STEM community. The new curriculum is being piloted at Brigham Young University as a new degree program.
The textbooks are being published by a national publisher, and both the lab manuals and supporting materials will be made freely available online. The assessment and evaluation plans focus primarily on student learning, student demand for the program, and employer interest in graduates of the program.
The new curriculum brings mathematical analysis, algorithm design, and mathematical modeling into the forefront of interdisciplinary study in the pure and applied sciences. Scientific computing is taught in the context of big data and high performance computing.
The project creates a modern undergraduate curriculum which provides the foundation that students need to become world-class problem solvers and interdisciplinary innovators. This should increase student interest and participation in applied and computational mathematics, and expand the pipeline of young scholars in the mathematical sciences who are well equipped to face the challenges of the 21st Century and become leaders in the globally competitive STEM workforce.
