Excursions in Computation

Speaker: Wayne Patterson, Professor of Computer Science, Howard University

Time: Monday, November 16, 2 PM Location: Babbio 221
Host: Susanne Wetzel

Abstract:
The author is reminded of the old expression: "Something old, something new; something borrowed, something blue." Although reluctant to suggest a presentation anything like a wedding ceremony, he will look anew at some old computational concepts involving the Pascal
triangle; something new (to many) in a related application revisiting a public key crypto chestnut; borrowing some ideas from what is now usually described as "experimental mathematics". Something blue? You'll have to wait and see.

Bio:
Wayne Patterson was born in Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada. He received the B. Sc. (Honours) in Applied Mathematics at the University of Toronto in 1966; M. Sc. in Mathematics also from Toronto in 1967; and the Ph. D. in Mathematics from the University of Michigan in 1971, in the field of differential topology. He also later received the M. Sc. in Computer Science from the University of New Brunswick in 1982. He was a Post-Doctoral Fellow in 1971-2 at Princeton University and in 1972-73 at the University of California at Berkeley.

In 1968, he began to teach in an exemplary project called Project SEED, which teaches advanced mathematics (high school and college level algebra and calculus) to inner-city at-risk students throughout the United States and elsewhere. He taught in this project and became its Associate National Director until 1975; although he remained on its Board of Directors and has now served as the Chair of Project SEED’s Board of Directors for the past 24 years. The SEED Project, now in its 46th year, continues to serve tens of thousands of at-risk students annually.

In 1975, he returned to Canada to join the Government of Canada, serving as Special Assistant and Economic Advisor to the Secretary of State and later the Deputy Prime Minister of Canada.

He returned to higher education as a professor of mathematics and later computer science at the Université de Moncton, the only French-language university in Canada outside of Québec. While teaching at Moncton, he also was a candidate for the House of Commons of Canada, and the Legislature of the Province of New Brunswick; and was twice elected as the national Vice-President of the Liberal Party of Canada.

In 1984, Dr. Patterson was appointed Chair of the Department of Computer Science at the University of New Orleans, and in 1988 Associate Vice Chancellor for Research at that university. In 1993, he was appointed Vice President for Research and Professional and Community Services, and Dean of the Graduate School at the College of Charleston and the University of Charleston, South Carolina.

In 1998, he was selected by the Council of Graduate Schools, the national organization of graduate deans and graduate schools, as the Dean in Residence at the national office in Washington, DC. His other service to the graduate community in the United States has included being elected to the Presidency of the Conference of Southern Graduate Schools, and also to the Board of Directors of the Council of Graduate Schools.

Since the year 2000, he has been the Senior Fellow for International Programs and Academic Program Review in the Graduate School at Howard University, and Professor of Computer Science at Howard as well. From December 2003 to July 2006, he also served as Associate Vice Provost for Research at Howard.

In his own disciplinary research, Dr. Patterson has published more than 50 scholarly articles, and a leading textbook, Mathematical Cryptology (Rowman and Littlefield, 1986). He has been the principal investigator on over 35 external grants valued at over $6,000,000.

In August 2006, he was loaned by Howard University to the US National Science Foundation to serve as the Foundation’s Program Manager for International Science and Engineering in Developing Countries. He completed this three-year rotation in August 2009 after having negotiated an agreement for joint funding of research in developing countries with USAID, and having made in 2009 the largest volume ever of NSF research projects involving Africa. He has now returned to the Graduate School staff at Howard.