Mary R. Parker

Education:

• Bachelor of Arts, Liberal Arts (Plan II), University of Texas at Austin, 1971. Phi Beta Kappa and Junior Fellow.
• Master of Arts, Mathematics, University of Oregon, 1972.
• Substantial work on a Ph.D. in Mathematics, University of Texas at Austin, 1972-1976. Held a University Fellowship, 1973-75. Advisor: Newcomb Greenleaf. Area of research: Constructive mathematics.
• Doctor of Philosophy, Mathematics, University of Texas at Austin, 1988. Advisor: Carl Morris. Area of research: Empirical Bayes estimation and hierarchical models in statistics.

Teaching Experience:

• Senior Lecturer, University of Texas, Austin, TX. Department of Mathematics. 1989 - present (part-time.) Teaching one course each fall and spring semester. Mostly undergraduate and graduate mathematical statistics. (http://www.ma.utexas.edu/users/parker/)
• Professor, Austin Community College, Austin, TX, Department of Mathematics. 1978 - present. Taught mainly at the Rio Grande Campus from 1978 -1990, but including some at Ridgeview Campus. Taught mainly at the Northridge Campus since 1990, but including some at the Cypress Creek Campus. Usually teach statistics, some algebra course(s), and some calculus course(s) each semester. Served as campus Department Head 1995-1997 and, after reorganization, as elected Department Head for entire college in 1998-1999. Currently serving as Assistant Department Head for communication and scheduling. (http://www.austin.cc.tx.us/mparker/)
• North Harris County College, Houston, TX. Department Head of Mathematics, 1976 - 1978.
• Teaching Assistant and Assistant Instructor, Department of Mathematics, University of Texas at Austin, 1972-73 and 1975 - 76
• Teaching Assistant, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR. Department of Mathematics, 1971 - 1972.

Courses taught:

• Basic Math Skills (arithmetic), Prealgebra, Elementary Algebra, Intermediate Algebra
• College Algebra, Trigonometry, Precalculus
• Mathematics for Liberal Arts, Elementary Statistics, Technical Mathematics, Mathematics for Measurement
• Calculus I, Calculus II, Calculus III, Differential Equations
• Mathematical Statistics (undergraduate and graduate), Regression Analysis
• In 2001, developed an Internet Elementary Statistics course
• In 2000-2001, developed a new course, Mathematics for Measurement, as an alternative to Math for Liberal Arts. Includes measurement variation, trigonometry for measurement, and modeling with linear and exponential models

Committee Work with ACC:

• President of the Faculty Association, 1981-82. President of the Full-Time Faculty Senate 1991-92. Active on several committees in various years, including Policies and Procedures and Academic Affairs.
• Academic Policies and Standards Committee, Chairperson, 1994-1996.
• Academic Council, March - August 1996.
• Assessment and Advising Committee, 1993-1995, 2001-present.
• Self-Study Steering Committee, 1980-81.
• Mathematics Task Force. Served as Chairperson in 1979-80, 1994-1995, and 1998-1999.
• Web Advisory Committee, 1998 - present.
• Program Review Committee, 1999 - present.
• General Education Review Committee, 2000 - present.

Professional Organizations:

• Mathematical Association of America. Served on the Editorial Review Boards of the Spectrum series and the MAA Notes series, as a member of the joint committee of the MAA and the ASA on undergraduate statistics education, and on the committee to review the recommended library lists.
• American Statistical Association. Member of the Statistics Education Section, Statistical Consulting Section, and the Statistical Graphics Section.
• American Women in Mathematics
• Texas Junior College Teachers Association. Served as President in 1987-88, on the Professional Development Committee, the Nominating Committee, and the Long-Range Planning Committee.
• Texas Section of the Mathematical Association of America. Have served on the Executive Committee.
• Austin Chapter of the American Statistical Association. Have served as officer and Chairperson.

Other Professional Activities:

• Co-Principal Investigator (with George Cobb of Mount Holyoke College) of a $450,000 grant to the Mathematical Association America from the National Science Foundation, "Statistical Thinking and Teaching Statistics." (1993-95). We provided nine week-long summer workshops (with e-mail discussion before and after) for college mathematics teachers who teach statistics but have little training in statistics. These workshops discuss the current trends in statistics education toward the use of real data, projects, and activities, in addition to providing additional training in the statistical techniques. Also was a project coordinator for one workshop in 1994 and one in 1996, which was part of a follow-up grant.
• Editorial Review Board of the Journal for Statistical Education, a refereed electronic journal, 1992-1996.
• Presentations on Teaching Statistics. Frequently give talks at the Joint Mathematics Meetings and the Joint Statistics Meetings. Topics include teaching Mathematical Statistics, teaching Elementary Statistics, and curriculum initiatives. Have organized an invited panel on research in undergraduate mathematics courses at the math meetings. Have organized contributed paper sessions on statistics about seven different times in 1990 - 2000. Presenter in several MAA minicourses on teaching statistics with active learning strategies, 1995, 1999, and 2000.
• Presenter and project coordinator at two STATS workshops. Summer 1996, University of Tennessee, and Summer 1998, University of the Pacific.
• Associate Editor for The American Statistician, 2001 - present.
• Associate Editor for The Mathematical Monthly, 2001 - present.
• Advisory Board for development of ActivStats by Paul Velleman. 1997-98
• Undergraduate Statistics Education Initiative (American Statistical Association): April 2000 - present. Participated in invited conference in April 2000, planner and presenter at symposium in August 2000, prepared website and coauthored paper on minors in statistics. (http://www.amstat.org/education/usei.html or http://www.ma.utexas.edu/users/parker/minors/), and participated in invited planning conference in July 2001.
• Curriculum Foundations Initiative (Mathematical Association of America): Fall 2000 - present. Participated in invited conference for statistics in October 2000 and invited conference on summarizing results from all the conferences in November 2001. (Was invited to particpate in invited conference on mathematics in technical areas in community colleges on September 15-18, 2001, but the conference was cancelled because of difficulty in air transportation.)
• Curriculum development for prospective middle-school teachers under grant to Southwest Texas State University, 2001 - present. Preparing modules on statistics and trigonometry.
• Set up and maintain websites for various committees, departments, and other organizations. 1996 - present.
  ACC Board of Trustees, 1996 - 1999; ACC Executive VP for Instruction, 1999 - 2001; ACC Associate VP for Academic areas and Deans of Academic areas, 1999 - present; numerous pages for ACC math department, 1996 - present; ACC Biotechnology Department, 2000 - present; General Education Review Committee, 2000 - present; Department pages for all ACC departments (approximately 40) who don't have their self-maintained own web page, 1999 - present. Have assisted numerous departments and administrative areas get started with web pages and provide back-up assistance when they have trouble.
  Austin Chapter of ASA, 1999 - present; Joint Committee on Undergraduate Statistics of MAA and ASA, 1997 - present.
  St. Luke United Methodist church, 1999 - present; Turk Pipkin, author and performer, 2000 - present.

Other Community Activities:

• College Houses, Inc. 1969-71, 1973-76, 1978-86. Founding Director of 21^st Street College House; Chairman of the Board, 1974-75; Community member of the Board, 1978-86; Chairperson of the Committee on Management, Operations, and Organization, most of 1978-86. This non-profit organization provides a residential-college-like experience for college students in Austin. During the years from 1969-86, we expanded from an organization of about 80 members who individually rented rooms in a house owned by a private landlord to an organization which owns and operates five residences housing approximately 500 members.
• Central Texas Mutual Housing Association. Board member 1989-95; President 1993; Secretary most of the rest of the time. Founded in 1989, this non-profit organization owns and operates mutual housing for about 1200 low- and moderate-income families in apartments and duplex communities in the Austin and Fort Worth and Dallas areas.
• Wesley Foundation. Board member 1995-1999. This organization of the United Methodist Church provides outreach to the college-student community in Austin through a program at Wesley House, near the UT campus, and student programs at Huston-Tillotson College, First United Methodist Church, University United Methodist Church, and St. Luke United Methodist Church.

Last updated January 4, 2002. Mary Parker, parker@math.utexas.edu.