Annie Selden facts for kids
Annie Laurer Alexander Selden is a very smart person who is an expert in how to teach mathematics. She used to be a professor at Tennessee Technological University and now teaches at New Mexico State University. In 1971, she helped start a group called the Association for Women in Mathematics.
Annie Selden's Early Life and Learning
Annie Laurer Alexander Selden was born Annie Louise Laurer. She finished college at Oberlin College in 1959. After that, she learned how to program computers during a summer job at IBM. She even traveled to Germany to study math at the University of Göttingen with a special scholarship called a Fulbright Scholarship.
Later, with help from the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, she earned a master's degree from Yale University in 1962. She finished her Ph.D. (a very high degree) from Clarkson University in 1974. Her Ph.D. paper was about a math topic called Bisimple ω-semigroups in the locally compact setting. She wrote it under the name Annie Laurer Alexander. Her professor, John Selden Jr., helped her with this paper, and they later got married.
Annie Selden's Teaching Career
Annie Selden first wanted to be a math researcher. But when she finished school, it was hard to find a research job. So, she started teaching math in other countries. This experience, especially teaching math to students who didn't speak English very well, made her interested in how to teach math better.
She taught at many universities, including the State University of New York at Potsdam, Hampden–Sydney College, Boğaziçi University in Turkey, and Bayero University Kano in Nigeria. In 1985, she joined Tennessee Technological University. She stopped working there in 2003 and moved to New Mexico.
Awards and Special Recognitions
Annie Selden has received several important awards for her work:
- In 2002, she won the Louise Hay Award from the Association for Women in Mathematics. This award is given to women who have made great contributions to math education.
- She was also chosen as the AWM/MAA Falconer Lecturer in 2002. This is a special lecture given by a woman who has done important work in math or math education.
- In 2003, she became a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. This means she was recognized as a top scientist.
- There is even an award named after her and her husband called the Annie and John Selden Prize. It is given by the Mathematical Association of America.
