For application FAQs (technical questions), please see: https://gradschool.umd.edu/admissions/admissions-requirements

Dr. A. Kadir Aziz has named this fund in memory of Professor Emeritus John E. Osborn.  Professor Osborn received his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1965 and went on to spend his entire career at the University of Maryland, where he specialized in numerical analysis and elliptic partial differential equations.  He served with distinction as Chair of the Department of Mathematics from 1982-1985 and as Acting or Interim Dean of the College of Computer, Mathematical and Physical Sciences from 1989-90 and 1998-99.  He was instrumental in the SCHOL project to update the Department of Mathematics’ undergraduate curriculum.  In September 2000, a conference on Finite Element Analysis and Eigenvalue Problems was held in his honor.  Although Professor Osborn officially retired at the end of the 2007-2008 academic year, he continued to be an active participant in department seminars and affairs up until his death on May 30, 2011, at the age of 74.

2024-25 Recipients

Bilal Aytekin

Leanna Breland

Owen Guch

Qihang Li

Noorain Noorani

Michael Rozowski

Valerie Wray

2023-24 Recipients

Oscar Coppola

Nicholas Forman

Ben Goldschlager

Mohammad Sharifi Kiasari

Isabelle Stepler

Leah White

2022-23 Recipients

Pablo Cedillos

Amandeep Chanda

Chang Chen

Foivos Chnaras

Tyler Clark

Samuel DiPasqua

Nathan Janus

Brandon Kolstoe

2021-22 Recipients

Mengting Chao

Prakhar Gupta

Revati Jadhav

Zhirui Li

Jian-Long Liu

David Russell

HaeYun Seo

Max Springer

2020-21 Recipients

Jingcheng Lu

Haoran Li

Mariam Askari

Luis Suarez

Zack Greenberg

Shahnawaz Khalid

Nolan Coble

Jiaxin Yuan

2019-20 Recipients

Marco Bornstein

Lucas Bouck

Keith Mills

Sheyda Peyman

Ayushi Saxena

Avi Schwarzchild

Shin Eui Song

Melanka Wedige

2018-19 Recipients

Kyle Liss

Tong Lu

Steven Reich

Aquia Richburg

Arghya Sadhukhan

Jiaqi Zhou

Sahil Chopra

Eric Kubischta

2017-18 Recipients

Charles Daly

Nathan Dykas

Pratima Hebbar

Ishfaaq Mohammed Imtiyas

Ayala Nuriely

Eric Oden

Ke Xue

2016-2017 Recipients

Kristin Carfora

Liam Fowl

Nicholas Paskal

Tengfei Su

Adil Virani

Nathan Yu

2015-2016 Recipients

Sean Ballentine

Chae Clark

Stefan Doboszczak

Rebecca Black

Oliver Rourke

Nakhila Mistry

2014-2015 Recipients

Xia Hu

Siming He

Lucia Simonelli

Richard Rast

Ryan Hunter

Patrick Daniels

2013-2014 Recipients

Robert Maschal 

Matthew Whiteway

Oliver Lum

Ryan Kirk

Jinhang Xue

Sam Bloom

2012-2013 Recipients

Matthew Becker

Colleen Stock

James Murphy

Matt Begue

Jacob Ralston

2011-2012 Recipients

Adam Lizzi

Kanna Nakamura

Geoffrey Clapp

Maxx Cho

Jong Jun Lee

2010-2011 Recipients

Hana Ueda

Catherine Ochalek

Stephen Balady

Alexander Cloninger

Each year the Mathematics Department hosts a competition for graduate students called Spotlight on Research, with cash prizes. The competition is run and judged by current studnets in the MATH, AMSC, and STAT programs.

Previous winners are at this link: Spotlight on Graduate Research Awards


The requirements below are for students in pure mathematics, not in statistics. For students in Statistics: Qualifying Exams must be passed in Statistics, Probability, and Applied Statistics.

1. Students must pass 2 qualifying exams from the following list:

Algebra (Math 600, 601)
Analysis (Math 630, 660)
Geometry (Math 730, 740; Exam not available to students entering in 2018 or later)
Probability (Stat 600, 601)
Statistics (Stat 700, 701)

A student in pure mathematics can use at most one of Probability and Statistics to satisfy the exam requirement.

The Geometry exam will be discontinued after January 2020. Until then, it will only be available to students admitted during 2017 or earlier.

2. Students must take four additional semesters of courses from the following list, with a grade point average of 3.3 or better for the four courses used to satisfy this requirement. Courses with grades less than B cannot be included (for example, B− is not allowed).

Math 600, 601 (Algebra)
Math 630, 660 (Analysis)
Math 730, 740 (Geometry)
Stat 600, 601 (Probability)
Stat 700, 701 (Statistics)
Math 634 (Harmonic Analysis)
Math 642 (Dynamical Systems I)
Math 712, Math 713 (Logic)
Math 734 (Algebraic Topology)
Math 744 (Lie Groups)
AMSC 666, AMSC 667 (Numerical Analysis)
Math 631 (Real Analysis)
Math 670 (ODE)
Math 673, Math 674 (PDE)

The four semesters are not required to be in the same sequence of courses. For example, Math 730, Math 670, AMSC 666, and AMSC 667 would be acceptable. These four semester-long courses must be distinct from the ones supporting the qualifying exams passed in Part 1.

A student may take and pass a third (and possibly, a fourth) qualifying exam in place of taking the actual courses. For example, passing the written exams
in Algebra, Analysis, and Geometry would count as 2 exams plus 2 semesters.

One qualifying exam must be passed by January of the second year, and all requirements must be finished by January of the third year.

Students who have taken courses from the second list elsewhere may petition the graduate chair to have such courses satisfy up to two semesters of the four-semester requirement (although generally students should instead use these courses as preparation for qualifying exams).

Each course on the lists should have serious assessment methods (graded homework, projects, exams, and/or similar). There should be some significant assessment that is guaranteed to be done solely by the student (that is, an exam, not only homework).

For the M.A. degree in Mathematics, students have two options:

Option I. Write a Masters thesis and satisfy the University requirements.

Option II. (a) Receive at least an MA Pass on two PhD written exams from the following list, and write a scholarly paper (as required by the Graduate School):

Algebra (Math 600, 601)
Analysis (Math 630, 660)
Geometry (Math 730, 740)
Probability (Stat 600, 601)
Statistics (Stat 700, 701)

A student in pure mathematics can use at most one of Probability and Statistics to satisfy the exam requirement. Note that students are required to take the exams that are written at the PhD level and receive a MA Pass. No separate MA-only exams will be written.

The Geometry exam will be discontinued after January 2020. Until then, it will only be available to students admitted during 2017 or earlier.

(b) In addition to the Qualifying Exams, students using Option II must take three additional semesters of courses from the following list. Courses with grades less than B cannot be included (for example, B− is not allowed).

Math 600, 601 (Algebra)
Math 630, 660 (Analysis)
Math 730, 740 (Geometry)
Stat 600, 601 (Probability)
Stat 700, 701 (Statistics)
Math 634 (Harmonic Analysis)
Math 642 (Dynamical Systems I)
Math 712, Math 713 (Logic)
Math 734 (Algebraic Topology)
AMSC 666, AMSC 667 (Numerical Analysis)
Math 631 (Real Analysis)
Math 670 (ODE)
Math 673, Math 674 (PDE)

The three semesters are not required to be in the same sequence of courses. For example, Math 730, Math 670, and AMSC 666 would be acceptable. These three semester-long courses must be distinct from the ones supporting the qualifying exams. For example, if the Algebra Exam is used as one of the Qualifying Exams, then neither Math 600 nor Math 601 can be used for the three-course requirement.

 

Jobs Obtained by Our Recent PhDs in Mathematics

2007-2008

Lockheed Martin, Univ. Bremen, CUNY, Stephen F. Austin College (2), Harvard, Univ. of Maryland, Columbia College (Chicago)

2008-2009

Franklin & Marshall College, NSA, Universitat Munster, Bloomberg, Berkeley, Academia Sinica, JHU Applied Physics Lab, Yale, NIH, Nanyang Technological Univ. (Singapore)

2009-2010

Univ. of Nicosia (Cyprus), Univ. of Paris VII, Towson Univ., Univ. of Utah, Army Research Lab, NSA (3), Nat'l Geospatial Intelligence Agcy., Univ. of Victoria (Canada)

2010-2011

Univ. of Maryland, Univ. of British Columbia, Songkhla Univ. (Thailand), Decisive Analytics, Notre Dame, Duke Univ. (2), Rice Univ., Mahidol Univ. (Thailand)

2011-2012

Univ. of Chicago, Bloomberg, Brown, Aalto Univ. (Finland), Univ. Wisconsin, Cornell Univ., Howard Univ., Georgetown Univ., Univ. of Massachusetts, Yield Book (Citibank)

2012-2013

Northrop-Grumman, Jane Street Capital (NY), Univ. Minnesota, Univ. of Illinois at Chicago, Universite Libre de Bruxelles, Univ. of Chicago

2013-2014

NSA, Cornell Univ., Michigan State Univ., Univ. Luxembourg, Univ. of Maryland

2014-2015

Universidad Catolica de Valparaiso (Chile), Department of Defense, University of Maryland (2), US Treasury, NSA, Rutgers Univ., Army Research Lab, Quantifind (CA), Duke Univ., Courant Institute, Boston Univ., Celerity, US Census Bureau

2015-16

NYU, Univ. of Maryland (3), NSA, Data Science, Sphere of Influence, Northwestern University, University of Iowa

2016-17

Univ. of Oklahoma Norman, Department of Defense, IHES, U. Penn, Facebook, Univ. of Maryland

2017-18

FDA, Univ. of Maryland, Courant Institute, New York Univ., Ohio State Univ., UC Irvine, AbbVie Inc.

2018-19

Department of Defense, NSA, Univ. of Maryland, Univ.of Texas, Goldman Sachs, Duke Univ., East Carolina Univ., Univ.of Wisconsin

2019-20

Univ. of Colorado, Univ. of Maryland, Pennsylvania State Univ, Texas A&M Univ., Univ. of Michigan, PayPal, Wells Fargo

2020-21

Nicolaus Copernicus Univ., U.S. Census Bureau, Univ. of Copenhagen, MITRE Corporation, Brown Univ, Army Research Laboratory, Eli Lilly and Company, Univ. of Pennsylvania, Univ. of Maryland, and Actifai