MCS

Year: 2018

  • December Problems of the Month

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    jsiehler

    Congratulations to November’s successful solvers: Filip Belik, Sam Thompson, and James Wittrig. December’s Problem #1 is a slippery, sliding rearrangement problem: Each move in the game below consists of sliding two checkers from adjacent boxes to two open positions, keeping them adjacent and in their original order as they move. In three moves, the pattern…

  • November Problems of the Month

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    jsiehler

    Congratulations to September’s successful solvers: Filip Belik and James Wittrig. Honorable mention to James Boykin for a promising partial solution to #2. November’s Problem 1 is an assembly problem in the style of classic tangram puzzles: Seven puzzle pieces have been drawn on a grid of 30-60-90 triangles. Show how they can be arranged to…

  • October Problems of the Month

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    jsiehler

    Congratulations to September’s successful solvers: Filip Belik, Sam Thompson, Katherine Williams, and James Wittrig. Throughout the fall semester, we’re hosting “Problems of the Month” here, and we invite everyone throughout the college to take part! Students, faculty, and staff are welcome to submit solutions, and there are prizes for the top student solvers during the…

  • September Problems of the Month

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    jsiehler

    Throughout the fall semester, we’ll be hosting “Problems of the Month” here, and we invite everyone throughout the college to take part! Everyone is welcome to submit solutions, and there are prizes for the top student solvers during the fall (details below). September’s Problem #1 is a puzzle with a map: The small, yet verdant…

  • Open MCS Faculty Positions

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    anienow2

    Do you want to join a friendly, cooperative group of teachers and scholars?

  • MCS Puzzle Contest

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    anienow2

    We have been sending out a weekly teaser problem in our announcements of the Pizza & Problem Solving sessions in the MCS Department.  Although we are finished meeting for the year, we’d still like to offer some problems and puzzles for you to work on.  We’ll have some small prizes for the best solutions.  You can find the…

  • MCS Puzzle Contest

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    anienow2

    Hello All,   We have been sending out a weekly teaser problem in our announcements of the Pizza & Problem Solving sessions that the MCS Department has been hosting on Tuesday afternoons. We would like to make this a little more official and turn these into a problem solving contest. The plan is to post a problem (or two) maybe…

  • MCS Alumni Profile: Jillian (Lyon) Downey ’08

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    anienow2

    Jillian (Lyon) Downey graduated from Gustavus in 2008 with a degree in mathematics.  She received her MS in Statistics from The University of Iowa in 2010 and her PhD in Statistics from Iowa State University in 2017.  She is now an Assistant Professor of Statistics at Truman State University (Kirksville, MO)   Congratulations and good luck with…

  • 2018 Pi Day

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    anienow2

    Pictures from the 2018 Pi Day celebration.  

  • MCS Alumni Profile: Laura (Graen) Rapacz ’01

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    anienow2

    Tell us about yourself. I graduated from Gustavus in 2001 with degrees in Mathematics and Computer Science. I am currently working as an actuary at Travelers. How did the MCS department help you get where you are today? The MCS department gave me great math and computer science  background.  However, I wish I had taken…