Miller makes math fun

Andy Miller is the guy you tried to crib answers from in high school algebra. The 29-year-old math professor at Belmont has always thought a little differently than most people, and as a result he picked math as a career.

These days, he spends his time convincing Belmont students that math is worth their while. He spoke about the challenges he faces at his job and on how popular perceptions of math folks don't always add up.

What kind of person wants to do math for a living? I think the sort of person that picks math is a person who is fascinated by patterns or who likes to solve problems. Often mathematicians like to solve puzzles or riddles. Also, and this is a little less known, often mathematicians are very into music. There are a lot of very strong research-level mathematicians who are very accomplished violinists or pianists.

Do you play any instruments? I don't. I sing, though. I was in my college choir as an undergraduate, and I sing in the church choir at Belmont.

How do you convince students at a small liberal arts college that math is worth their time? One idea people have mentioned is to put your most enthusiastic teachers in introductory courses, because if you turn a student off early, you're never going to get them. When I talk to students who come to general education classes, I ask them to write a little math autobiography. It's amazing how often their opinions of math classes are based on their opinion of the teacher.

Do you approve of how mathematicians are portrayed in movies and TV? I was just talking to my mom about the movie Proof and also A Beautiful Mind. It just so happens that both of the mathematicians are struggling with schizophrenia. There's sort of this idea out in the common depictions of mathematicians that there's this association between math and insanity. It's a little annoying to the community sometimes. We recognize that the exceptional cases are the most interesting to the general public, but at the same time, it'd be nice if people realized that mathematicians might be a little more analytical, but other than that we have just as wide a range of personalities as the general populace.