Past Events

AWM hosts a mixture of academic seminars, social events, and personal and professional development workshops.
(For more on our past events, see our blog at https://wp.wpi.edu/awm/.)

2025 - 2026

Spring 2026

  • Jan 28     AWM/WiCS GitHub Workshop: Part of our Personal and Professional Development Series (collaboration with the Women in Computer Science)
  • Feb 05     February GBM: Launched SK Day 2026 and played an (almost) e Day-related word game.
  • Feb 23     SK Day Activity Brainstorming
  • Mar 05     March GBM: Watched Secrets of the Surface: The Mathematical Vision of Maryam Mirzakhani. (Learn more about this documentary at Zala Films.)
  • Mar 23     Math Class Registration Session (collab with ASA, Math Club, and SIAM)
  • Apr 02      April GBM: Review of SK Day preparation steps and day-of schedule
  • Apr 03      Coffee & Conversation with Dr. Jinyoung Park: AWM hosted coffee, snacks, and conversation with Dr. Jinyoung Park, who was awarded the 2025 Levi L. Conant Prize for her paper “Threshold Phenomena for Random Discrete Structures" (Notices of the American Mathematical Society, 70, 2023). She delivered the 2025 Levi L. Conant Lecture at WPI.
  • Apr 11      Sonia Kovalevsky Day
  • Apr (multiple days) Women in STEM Mixer: Drop-in event for the spring 2026 Accepted Student Days, featuring WPI's women-focused student groups

Fall 2025

  • Aug 21     Student Activities Fair
  • Aug 27     AWM Welcome Event
  • Sep 04     September GBM: Introduced the chapter, the members, and the classic game SET.
  • Sep 17     AWM/SIAM LaTeX Workshop: Part of our Personal and Professional Development Series (collaboration with the Society of Industrial and Applied Mathematics; resources available on our blog).
  • Sep 25     New Faculty Meet-and-Greet: With Profs. Charly Fowler and Jane Coons
  • Oct 02     October GBM: Announced upcoming events and volunteer opportunities in October and played a Sudoku-inspired, Tic-Tac-Toe-like game.
  • Oct 20     Family STEM Night Prep Session: Designed an informational poster and created sample crafts in preparation for a math biology exhibit at Family STEM Night, an annual event in Worcester. A collaboration of AWM and the Bioinformatics and Computational Biology Club.
  • Oct 24     Family STEM Night with BCB: A collaborative outreach event with the Bioinformatics and Computational Biology Club. Read more about this event on our blog.
  • Oct 29     AWM/SIAM Personal Website Workshop: Part of our Personal and Professional Development Series (collaboration with the Society of Industrial and Applied Mathematics)
  • Oct 30     Seminar Series: Graduate Experiences Around the Country: A collaboration with Bryn Mawr College, FSU, Mizzou, and UTK
  • Nov 07     November GBM: Announced upcoming events and volunteer opportunities in November.
  • Nov 13     Counted Out Documentary Screening (with the STEM Education Center)
  • Nov 21     Seminar and Tea with Prof. Fatma Terzioglu: From Conventional CT to Multi-Energy CT: Modeling, Invertibility, and Parameter Design
  • Nov 24     Cutie Pies Thanksgiving Bake-Off (collaboration with Women+ in Robotics Engineering)
  • Dec 04     December GBM: Social hour to chat about the semester over cocoa and cookies.

AWM Book Club

  • Sep 02     Read an excerpt from Fifty Years of Women in Mathematics.
  • Sep 16     Read Proof, by David Auburn.
  • Sep 30     Read Flatland, by Edwin A. Abbott.
  • Oct 21     Read Closing the Gap, by Vicky Neale.
  • Nov 11    Continued Closing the Gap, by Vicky Neale and started How to Bake Pi, by Eugenia Cheng.
  • Jan 27      Read the short story "What It Means When a Man Fall From the Sky," by Lesley Nneka Arimah.
  • Feb 24     Read A Tangled Tale, by Lewis Carroll.
  • Mar 24     Read chapters 1 through 5 of The Housekeeper and the Professor, by Yoko Ogawa.

2024 - 2025

Spring 2025

  • Feb 26     C-Term General Body Meeting
  • Mar 30    Women in STEM Activities Fair
  • Apr 10     SK Day Overview
  • Apr 12     Sonia Kovalevsky Day

Fall 2024

  • Aug 19     3rd Annual ODIME Annual Reception
  • Sep 05     AWM Welcome Event
  • Sep 13     Coffee Hour with Dr. Jen Hom: AWM hosted coffee, snacks, and conversation with Dr. Hom, who was awarded the 2024 Levi L. Conant Prize for her paper "Getting a handle on the Conway knot" (Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, 59 (2021), 19–29). She delivered the 2024 Levi L. Conant Lecture at WPI.
  • Sep 20     A-Term General Body Meeting: Brainstorm ideas for the upcoming term and discuss our WPI experiences with Lauren Feldman, Assistant Director for Gender Equity and Sexuality at ODIME.
  • Sep 22     Women in STEM Activities Fair
  • Oct 04     Destress Night: Coffee + Crochet (in collaboration with Crochet Club)
  • Nov 04     AWM Seminar Series: Prof. Maria Fung (Worcester State): A Journey to the Open Heart: Reflections on Teaching, Trauma, and Healing
  • Nov 08     Milk & Cookies with ODIME
  • Nov 15     Coffee Hour with Becca Thomases: AWM hosted coffee, snacks, and conversation with Dr. Thomases before her colloquium presentation on micro-organism locomotion in viscoelastic fluids.
  • Dec 06     Winter Paper Crafts (in collaboration with Art & Design Club)

2023 - 2024

Spring 2024

  • Feb 02     Lunch and Lecture with Dr. Lisa Fauci: Waving, rotating, buckling: filaments in flow at the microscale
  • Mar 27     Seminar Series: Student Seminar: Presentations from Marcela Vasconcellos, Scarlett Clarke, and Augustine Benjamin (see flyer here)
  • Apr 06     Sonia Kovalevsky Day

Fall 2023

  • Sep 13     AWM Welcome Event
  • Sep 27     Seminar Series Student Talks: Presentations from Sarah LaRusso, Camille Williams, and Peiyao Lai (see flyer here)
  • Nov 17     Seminar and Lunch with Dr. Elizabeth Newman: Training Made Easy: Harnessing Structure and Curvature Information to Train Neural Networks Efficiently

2022 - 2023

Spring 2023

  • Feb 03     AWM Seminar Series: Beth Blumberg: Women in Competition Math
  • Feb 15     Personal and Professional Development Series: Graduate School Panel
  • Feb 20     Coffee Hour Social
  • Apr 15     Sonia Kovalevsky Day

Fall 2022

  • Sep 02     AWM Welcome Event
  • Sep 27     Meet the Mathematicians (Part I): Meet-and-greet with the women mathematicians at WPI
  • Nov 10     Board Game Social
  • Nov 16     Meet the Mathematicians (Part II): Meet-and-greet with the women mathematicians at WPI
  • Dec 05     Personal and Professional Development Series: Industry Panel: With representatives from Amazon Robotics, Boston Scientific, Hanover Insurance and Santander.

2021 - 2022

Spring 2022

  • Feb 10     Personal and Professional Development Series: Graduate School Panel
  • Mar 23     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Elisenda Grigsby (Boston College): The Topology, Geometry, and Combinatorics of Neural Network Functions
  • Apr 09     Sonia Kovalevsky Day

Fall 2021

  • Sep 03     AWM Welcome Event
  • Sep 27     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Misha Kilmer (ICERM, Brown University): The Case for Tensor Factorization: Compression, Analysis and Reconstruction of Image Data
  • Oct 04     Personal and Professional Development Series: Resume & CV Workshop
  • Oct 26     AWM & SIAM Joint Seminar: Dr. Geneta Gray: Turning Your Math Skills into a Career in Data Science

2020 - 2021

Spring 2021

  • Feb 04     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Tracy Stepien (University of Florida): Using Mathematics to Understand Cancer and the Growth and Treatment of Tumors
  • Mar 02     Personal and Professional Development Series: Recognizing and Overcoming Gender Bias: With keynote speaker Dr. Tiffiny Butler
  • Apr 10      Sonia Kovalevsky Day
  • Apr 21      AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Francesca Bernardi (WPI): From Italy to WPI: Story of a PhD
  • May 04     Personal and Professional Development Series: Graduate School Experience

Fall 2020

  • Sep 21     Personal and Professional Development Series: Summer Opportunities
  • Sep 28     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Lucia Carichino (Rochester Institute of Technology): My Journey in Mathematical Biology
  • Oct 19     Movie Night: Secrets of the Surface
  • Oct 29     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Margaret Callahan (U.S. Dept of State): Quantitative Approaches to Global Conflict Analysis
  • Nov 17     Personal and Professional Development Series: Industry Opportunities for Women in Mathematics (see flyer here)

2019 - 2020

Spring 2020

  • Apr 04     Sonia Kovalevsky Day (held virtually)
  • Apr 28     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Sarah Gaichas (NOAA Fisheries): What Does Math Have to Do with Fish?

Fall 2019

  • Sep 27     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Laura Miller (University of Arizona): My Trajectory from Mathematics to Biology to Mathematics and Back to Biology
  • Nov 06     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Ruth Charney (Brandeis University): Groups, Geometry, and How I Got Here
  • Nov 20     Coffee Hour Social

2018 - 2019

Spring 2019

  • Feb 20     AWM Seminar Series: Clara Vu (VEO Robotics)
  • Mar 23     Sonia Kovalevsky Day
  • Apr 08     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Catherine Buell (Fitchburg State University): From Algebra to Ethics: Finding Meaningful Work and Navigating Academia

Fall 2018

  • Sep 21     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Daniela Calvetti (Case Western Reserve University): Inverse Problems, The Brain, and My Mathematical Journey
  • Nov 06     AWM Seminar Series: Dr. Sarah Spence Adams (Olin College): A Discussion and Mini-Workshop on Charting Your Professional Career