Memberships:

Mathematical Association of America: http://www.maa.org/
American Mathematical Society: http://www.ams.org/
American Statistical Society

Teaching Philosophy:

My teaching philosophy has always been particularly uncomplicated, and is most aptly encapsulated by Bertrand Russell’s (1872-1970) adage: “No man can be a good teacher unless he has feelings of warm affection toward his pupils and a genuine desire to impart to them what he believes to be of value.” - that, and the rather ambitious expectation that ardor is contagious.

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Biography:

I grew up surrounded by books and a profound sense of deference for education, a practice, which, according to Oscar Wilde (1854 – 1900), “makes one rogue cleverer than another,” which, I interpreted as the pursuit of knowledge at once esoteric and abstract for the sole purpose of attaining intellectual maturity, cultural sensitivity, and social consciousness. I was equally attracted to literature, mathematics, music, and physics and was having a hard time deciding which one of these disciplines to study in college. It was when I was, as a high school student, exposed to the indubitably enthralling facts that serious mathematics existed naturally in the universe and that it arose from relatively simple situations and reached immense levels of abstraction, that I knew that I was going to study mathematics.

My first encounter with the astounding prevalence of mathematics in nature had something to do with the tessellation (from the Greek tessera meaning square, derived in turn from the word for four) of the plane, that is, a covering of the plane with figures that fill the plane with no overlaps and no gaps. For stunningly ingenious examples of plane tessellations, one should see the paintings of the Dutch graphic artist Maurits Cornelis (M. C.) Escher (1890 – 1972)

Regular Division of the Plane III by Escher (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Escher,_Regular_Division_of_the_Plane_III.jpg)

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Research Interests:

My major research interests are mathematics and statistics education; philosophy of mathematics; philosophy of science; history of mathematics; relations between mathematics and other disciplines such as physics, philosophy, and music; and chaos theory. I have presented numerous papers on these and related topics in international conferences throughout the world.

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Honors & Awards:

1. Nominated to be the student speaker at the 2008 Commencement Ceremony at American University (February, 2008).
2. Mathematics Education Specialty Comprehensive Exam (History of Mathematics) passed with distinction (January, 2006).
3. Mathematics Education Comprehensive Exam passed with distinction (August, 2005).
4. Mathematics Comprehensive Exam passed with distinction (August, 2004).
5. Recipient of one year membership to The Mathematical Association of America for presenting a paper titled On the Arithmetic-Geometric Mean of Gauss> in the Fall Meeting of The Mathematical Association of America held at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, November 7 – 8, 2003.

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Publications:

1. Izmirli, Ilhan M. 2015. From Measurement Errors to Normal Distributions: A Brief History and Its Pedagogical Implications. In JSM Proceedings, Section on Teaching of Statistics in the Health Sciences. Alexandria, VA: American Statistical Association. 1487-1496.
2. A Passage through Brobdingnag: René Descartes and the Differential Calculus, November 2015. http://sections.maa.org/mddcva/Fall2015MeetingSlides.php
3. An Algorithm to Generalize the Pascal and Fibonacci Matrices. In Journal of Applied Mathematics. Vol. 6, No. 6, June, 2015. See also http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/am.2015.66101
4. Al-Maghribî’s Mecca Problem Meets Sudoku. http://www.hpm-americas.org/meetings/2015-east-coast/​ March, 2015.
5. On Some Properties of Digital Roots. In Advances in Pure Mathematics. Vol. 4, No. 6, June 2014. See also http://www.scirp.org/journal/APM/.
6. On the Insolvability of the Demarcation Problem. In International Journal of Academic Research in Education and Review, May 2014. See also http://www.academicresearchjournals.org/IJARER/All%20Articles.htm
7. Wittengstein’s Language Games and Forms of Life from a Social Constructivist Point of View. In American Journal of Educational Research. Volume 2, Number 4, 2014
8. Interval Vectors. http://sections.maa.org/mddcva/Spring2014MeetingSlides.php. May 2014.
9. Wittgenstein Was a Social Constructivist. http://sections.maa.org/mddcva/Spring2013Meeting.php, May 2013.

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Presentations:

1. A Passage through Brobdingnag: René Descartes and the Differential Calculus. Contributed paper presented in the Fall Meeting of The Mathematical Association of America held at St. Mary’s College of Maryland, St. Mary’s City, MD, November 6 - 7, 2015
2. From Measurement Errors to Normal Distributions: A Brief History and Its Pedagogical Implications. Contributed paper presented in the “Strategies, Issues, and Examples for Teaching Statistics in Health Sciences — Contributed Papers” session of the 2015 Joint Statistical Meetings held in the Washington State Convention Center, Seattle, Washington. August 08 –13, 2015.
3. An Old Problem Meets Modern Day Sudoku. Contributed paper presented in the Meeting of History and Pedagogy of Mathematics – Americas Section held at American University, Washington, D.C., March 13 – 15, 2015.
4. Interval Vectors. Contributed paper presented in the Spring Meeting of The Mathematical Association of America held at James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA. April 25-26, 2014.
5. A Case Study on the Use of History in Statistics Classes: The Fisher-Neyman Dispute. Contributed paper presented in the "Teaching outside the Box, Ever So Slightly" session of the 2013 Joint Statistical Meetings held in Palais des congrès de Montréal, Montréal, Canada. August 3 – 8, 2013.
6. Wittgenstein Was a Social Constructivist. Contributed paper presented in the Spring Meeting of The Mathematical Association of America held at Salisbury University, Salisbury MD. April 12-13, 2013.
7. An Elementary Proof of Mean Inequalities. Contributed paper presented in the Fall Meeting of The Mathematical Association of America held at Virginia Military Institute, Lexington, VA. October 26-27, 2012.
8. Izmirli, I. and S. Surina-Chimiak. Bloom’s Taxonomy and the Teaching of Introductory Statistics Classes. Contributed paper presented in The Joint Statistical Meetings of the American Statistical Society held in San Diego Convention Center July 28 - August 2, 2012.

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Book Reviews:

1. Euler’s Constant: Proof of Its Irrationality and Transcendence by Means of the Infinite (-1)! = 1000… The review was for P.R.M. October 2015.
2. Tridiagonal Matrices via K-Balancing Numbers. The review was for the British Journal of Mathematics and Computer Science. June, 2015.
3. A Voronoskaya type theorem for Bernstein-Durrmeyer type operators. The review was for the British Journal of Mathematics and Computer Science. May, 2015.
4. Rigueur-contraintes: mathématiques-musique. By Thierry Paul. Gazette des Mathématiciens (139, 71 – 77, 2014). The review was for Mathematical Reviews/MathSciNet. www.ams.org/mresubs. July 2014.
5. The geometry of musical rhythm: What makes a “good” rhythm good? By Godfried T. Toussaint. CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL, 2013. The review was for Mathematical Reviews/MathSciNet. www.ams.org/mresubs. August 2013.
6. Statistics: Principles and Methods by Richard Johnson (Seventh Edition). John Wiley and Sons, NJ. August 27, 2012.
7. Mind on Statistics (Fourth Edition) by Jessica M. Utts and Robert F. Heckard. Publisher: Brooks/Cole Cengage Learning. July 24 2012.
8. Mathematical Statistics for Engineering and the Sciences. Author Unknown. Publisher: W. H. Freeman. March 6, 2011.

Courses Taught:

College Algebra Mathematics of Finance Finite Mathematics Precalculus Precalculus with Trigonometry Calculus I Calculus II Calculus III Multivariate Calculus Linear Algebra Mathematical Analysis Real Analysis Probability Theory Probability for Engineers Descriptive Statistics Inferential Statistics Ordinary Differential Equations Fourier and Laplace Transforms Numerical Analysis I

Numerical Analysis II (graduate level) Advanced Applied Mathematics I Advanced Applied Mathematics II (graduate level) Modern Abstract Algebra Computer Aided Geometric Design (graduate level) Mathematical Logic Qualitative Analysis (graduate level) Operations Research (graduate level) Productions and Operations Management (graduate level) Mathematical Modeling Philosophy of Science History of Science French I Logic General Physics Introduction to Information Systems Computers and Management Introduction to Mathematical Thought Mathematics of Social Choice

Current Roles:

• Course Coordinator for STAT 250 – Introductory Statistics: September 2013 – Present.
• Department Representative in the Distance Education Committee: September 2013 – Present.

Personal Interests:

My interests outside of mathematics are world literature, philosophy, film, theater, and music. When not teaching my classes, spending time with my students, or conducting my research, I can be found taking long walks with my dogs or playing music with my friends in the Russian folk music ensemble Samovar: http://www.samovarmusic.com/. I am also a member of Washington Balalaika Society (http://www.balalaika.org/who.htm) where I play the alto balalaika.