UNews - Habiba Kadiri

PUBlic Professor Series talk delves into the scary world of mathematics and how to conquer math anxiety

trevor.kenney — Mon, 23 Jan 2023 18:45:01 +0000

Math anxiety forms at an early age and often follows us into adulthood — but math isn't going anywhere, and we use it to varied degrees throughout our entire lives. So, how do we cope with the associated anxiety?

Dr. Habiba Kadiri seeks to ease your mathematical fears.

On Thursday, January 26, ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge mathematics professor, Dr. Habiba Kadiri, will present Resilience in Mathematics as part of the PUBlic Professor Series. The free event runs from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Sandman Signature Lethbridge Lodge and is open to the public.

Solving a mathematical problem is a hurdle one encounters starting in elementary school. Attached to this is a unique educational issue known as math anxiety. Resilience and persistence are essential skills in research, and particularly in mathematics where problems can remain open for generations. In this talk, Kadiri will address the lifelong endeavour to tackle problems, both mathematical and societal, and find resources to overcome these issues.

Habiba Kadiri is a French-born mathematician working in the field of number theory. She has been a ULethbridge faculty member since 2007. Before moving to Lethbridge, Kadiri was a postdoctoral fellow in Montreal, where she was a member of Andrew Granville’s (CRC I, FRSC) dynamic research group. Kadiri received her BSc and MSc from Université de Bordeaux. She received her PhD from Université de Lille in 2002.

Wilk inspired to forge ahead with academic career in mathematics

trevor.kenney — Mon, 16 Jul 2018 21:14:54 +0000

Having recently returned from the 25th annual Women and Mathematics (WAM) program at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) in Princeton, New Jersey, the path to an academic career in mathematics is clearer than ever for fifth-year mathematics student, Kirsten Wilk.

Wilk grew up on a farm near Vauxhall, Alberta, and says that her high school math teacher, Nadine Schellenberg (BSc, BEd, ’08) was an incredible mentor and someone who always expressed enthusiasm about math. After attending an open house at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge (U of L), Wilk was inspired by the passion she encountered from people in the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science and, despite being uncertain what kind of career she desired, she decided to pursue a degree in math.

Throughout her time at the U of L, Wilk has taken full advantage of opportunities such as participating in co-op work terms, foreign exchanges and working as a research assistant with several of her professors.

“Going on an exchange to La Rochelle, France was an unforgettable experience. I got to live and study in another country for eight months, during which time I met incredible people from all over the world, learned French and gained confidence,” says Wilk, who was able to complete a minor in French over the course of her exchange.

She believes her experience growing up on a farm gave her the work ethic needed to succeed in post-secondary study. She has had the opportunity to return to agriculture through the Co-operative Education program and is currently completing her fourth co-op work term, this time with the Cereal Agronomy program at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada in Lethbridge.

During her previous co-op work terms with the Department of Mathematics & Computer Science, Wilk had the opportunity to work as a research assistant with Drs. Habiba Kadiri, Nathan Ng and Dave Morris. A direct result of these co-op opportunities is that she has one research paper that has been submitted to a journal, and two more that will be submitted after the final edits are complete. Her work as an NSERC USRA with Kadiri and Ng led to a presentation given during the U of L’s Number Theory and Combinatorics Seminar in Fall 2017, as well as a talk at the 2018 Alberta Number Theory Days X conference in Banff.

“It was a valuable experience to speak at a conference as an undergrad, and to be able to meet other math students and researchers in the province,” says Wilk.

She hopes that her published papers, speaking opportunities and attendance at conferences will help with acceptance into a master's program.

Both Kadiri and Ng speak highly of Wilk’s ability to absorb new material quickly, along with her enthusiasm, determination and curiosity during the course of their research project.

“I appreciate how determined Kirsten is to work in mathematical sciences. She has enough confidence to attack problems and does not shy away from the work it requires,” explains Kadiri.

Recently, Wilk’s professors encouraged her to apply to the WAM program at the IAS, a program dedicated to mentoring young female math students and researchers. This year was the 25th anniversary of the program, and many of its past participants have continued on to become great mathematical researchers and lecturers.

“It was inspiring to learn about mathematics from female lecturers, in a room full of female math students, as part of a program organized almost entirely by women,” says Wilk. “This year, the topic was modern cryptography and I really enjoyed learning about some practical applications of math to the real world – one of the lecturers showed us the math behind how the Enigma machine from WWII was broken. This lecturer was from the National Security Agency (NSA), so she had access to an actual Enigma machine, which she brought with her to demonstrate how it worked!”

While her acceptance and participation in the WAM program was a humbling experience, Wilk says it inspired her to continue pursuing a MSc and possibly a PhD.

“One of the most valuable takeaways from my experience at the IAS was the opportunity to talk about math with other women similar to myself at various stages of their academic careers,” says Wilk. “For example, I talked to one woman who did her master’s studying the mathematical theory behind general relativity. It never occurred to me that this was something that could be studied from a mathematical perspective and it got me excited about continuing my academic career in math!”

After she graduates in August, Wilk looks to fulfill her dream of a working holiday in Scotland before pursuing a master’s, either in Canada or Europe, studying applied mathematics in either physics, astronomy or mathematical engineering.

“I am very proud to be a woman studying math. I’ve been lucky to have several great mentors in math, many of whom are women. I think it’s important for women to support and encourage each other in any discipline, but particularly in a male-dominated discipline such as math.”

Women Scholars’ Speakers Series simplifies research with only 1,000 Words

trevor.kenney — Fri, 17 Nov 2017 18:24:25 +0000

The ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge Women Scholars’ Speakers Series takes the ten hundred word challenge in the upcoming panel discussion How We Came to Study The Things We Do.

Inspired by a panel held at the American Association for Physical Anthropology called Communicate Your Science Using English’s Ten Hundred Most Common Words, “the challenge aims to improve science communication in a jolly way,” says series co-chair Dr. Louise Barrett (psychology).

“The idea is that you explain what you do using only the most common words in the English language, forcing you to avoid jargon, and offering the possibility for some inspired renaming of things,” explains co-chair Dr. Josephine Mills (art). “Examples from the AAPA sessions include, ‘Dogs go places they are not from and eat weird animals in their homes: Reasons for fewer weird animals’, or my favourite, ‘The relationship between the soft pink things and the hard white things.”

During the panel discussion (Wednesday, Nov. 22, 7 to 9 p.m. at the Dr. Foster James Penny Building), five speakers from the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge take the challenge: Christine Clark (new media), Dr. Liz Galway (English), Dr. Habiba Kadiri (math), Darlene St. Georges (education) and Dr. Amy Shaw (history).

Each speaker will create a maximum three sentence description of what they do in their research using only the ten hundred most common English words.

“You can’t imagine my relief that ‘art’ is in the ten hundred words,” laughs Mills. “But art gallery is not. So my example if I were on the panel would be something like, ‘I want to understand better how people, especially if the people who come to see the art come from many places, think and feel about art that was made now when they go to the places that show this art. The places that give the money to make these plans want us to say how we know that our plans work, but these places do not have very good ways to understand how we know when the places that show art have done a good job.’”

The panelists are then able to use their full vocabulary to provide a 10-minute talk about how they came to work in their field.

How We Came to Study the Things We Do is free to attend, with a cash bar available. For more information on the Women Scholars' Speaker Series, check out their list of events.

��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge awarded record $3.9 million in NSERC funding

trevor.kenney — Mon, 22 Jun 2015 22:04:26 +0000

The ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge was awarded a record $3.9 million of funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) this year, with U of L researchers earning support for projects in neuroscience, biological sciences, psychology, chemistry & biochemistry, physics & astronomy, geography and mathematics & computer science.

This unprecedented level of support was announced earlier today by Canada’s Minister of State (Science and Technology), the Honourable Ed Holder, at a national funding announcement in Oshawa, Ont.

Dr. Robert McDonald’s base grant of $355,000 (over five years) is the largest NSERC grant awarded to the U of L this year.

“This latest round of NSERC funding clearly demonstrates the outstanding research our faculty and students are undertaking,” says Interim Vice-President (Research) Dr. Lesley Brown. “That our research portfolio continues to grow as it does is testament to the quality of the work being done and also speaks to the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ striking the right balance as a comprehensive teaching and research institution.”

��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge researchers receiving NSERC Discovery Grant funding include: Dr. Gerlinde Metz (neuroscience); Dr. Aaron Gruber (neuroscience); Dr. Alice Hontela (biological sciences); Dr. Jean-Baptiste Leca (psychology); Dr. David Logue (psychology); Dr. Artur Luczak (neuroscience); Dr. Robert McDonald (neuroscience); Dr. Majid Mohajerani (neuroscience); Dr. Gregory Pyle (biological sciences); Dr. Masami Tatsuno (neuroscience); Dr. Paul Vasey (psychology); Dr. Robert Laird (biological sciences); Dr. René Boeré (chemistry & biochemistry); Dr. Paul Hayes (chemistry & biochemistry); Dr. Locke Spencer (physics & astronomy); Dr. Mark Walton (physics & astronomy); Dr. Christopher Hopkinson (geography); Dr. Robert Benkoczi (mathematics & computer science); Dr. Shahadat Hossain (mathematics & computer science); Dr. Habiba Kadiri (mathematics & computer science); Dr. Nathan Ng (mathematics & computer science).

In addition, Drs. John Zhang and Olga Kovalchuk were each awarded NSERC Discovery Development Grants.

Luczak and McDonald will also both receive an additional $120,000 in funds through the Discovery Accelerator Supplements program (over a three-year period), while McDonald’s base grant of $355,000 (over five years) is the largest NSERC grant awarded to the U of L this year. He is studying neural circuits and mechanisms of context-specific conditioned inhibition.

The ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ’s doctoral students were extremely successful in the NSERC Doctoral Scholarship competitions, led by Katie Wilson (chemistry & biochemistry), who was named a Canada Vanier Scholar, demonstrating leadership skills and a high standard of scholarly achievement in graduate studies. Jason Flindall (neuroscience) was awarded a Canadian Doctoral Scholarship, while Kayla Stone (neuroscience), Allonna Harker (neuroscience) and Stefan Lenz (chemistry & biochemistry) were awarded NSERC Postgraduate Doctoral Scholarships. Additionally, five masters students were awarded the NSERC Canadian Graduate Scholarship, including: Justin Lee (neuroscience), Serena Shandik (neuroscience), Matthew Robbins (physics & astronomy), Rhys Hakstol (chemistry & biochemistry) and Douglas Turnbull (chemistry & biochemistry).

“We are pleased with the amount of money invested in our researchers and what this could yield in terms of the results they will achieve and the benefits their work will bring to society,” adds Brown. “Our continuing success with the federal research funding agencies is testament to our researchers’ ability to compete on the national stage.”

NSERC grants aim to develop, attract and retain the world’s most talented researchers at Canadian universities who are working in a multitude of scientific and engineering disciplines.

UNews - Habiba Kadiri

PUBlic Professor Series talk delves into the scary world of mathematics and how to conquer math anxiety

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