Below is information on the purpose and history of the scholarships and awards administered by the Mathematics Department. (See the official listings for more details; you can also view a list of past winners of the awards.)
Abramowitz Award
The Abramowitz Award is awarded for superior competence and promise in the field of mathematics and its applications.
This award was established in honor of Milton Abramowitz, a Maryland mathematics professor best known for his work on mathematical tables at the National Bureau of Standards (now NIST). Former winners include Charles Fefferman (a Fields Medalist) and Sergey Brin (cofounder of Google).
Antman Undergraduate Award
The Antman Undergraduate Award was established by Distinguished University Professor Stuart S. Antman in 2024. This award recognizes outstanding undergraduate students who are pursuing studies combining mathematics with one or more of the biological, chemical, engineering, and physical sciences.
Antman did his undergraduate studies at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, graduating in 1961. He earned a Ph.D. in 1965 from the University of Minnesota, under the supervision of William H. Warner. He joined the New York University faculty in 1967, and moved to Maryland in 1972. He became Distinguished University Professor at Maryland in 2001, and Distinguished University Research Professor in 2014.
Antman became a fellow of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics in 2009, and a fellow of the American Mathematical Society in 2012. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1978, and with John M. Ball he won the Theodore von Kármán Prize in 1999. In 1987 Antman won a Lester R. Ford Award. and in 2015 the Lyapunov Award from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.
Aziz Mathematics Scholarship
The Aziz Mathematics Scholarship is made on the basis of excellence in mathematics. This scholarship is the math department's highest award of excellence for a non-graduating math major.
This scholarship was first awarded in 2002. It is funded by Kadir Aziz, who received his Ph.D. in Mathematics from our department in 1958. Dr. Aziz was on the faculty of Georgetown University from 1956 to 1967, and has been on the faculty of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County since 1967. Throughout his career, Professor Aziz has been an active member of the Numerical Analysis group at College Park. He is also the sponsor of the Aziz Lecture series.
Euclid Teaching Assistantships
The Euclid Teaching Assistanships are awarded to math majors who are on a track to become future high school or middle school teachers and who demonstrate the promise to be excellent teaching assistants for a Calculus course. The winners serve as Teaching Assistants for a section of calculus in the fall and/or spring semester, generally using the close-contact small groups method. The winners are paid at the rate a graduate student in mathematics would be paid to teach the section. Interested students apply in the Spring semester and are selected for these assistantships for the following year.
Higginbotham Award
The Higginbotham Award is made to an outstanding junior mathematics major.
The award is in memory of Robert Michael Higginbotham, an excellent student who in 1967 received a Bachelor's degree in Mathematics here at College Park. Two years later, he was killed in the Vietnam War. His name can be found online at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall Page. The award was established by a donation of his family.
Carol Karp Award
The Carol Karp Award is made on the basis of outstanding performance in the field of logic.
The award was established in memory of Carol Karp (1926-1972), a Maryland mathematics professor and logician who had a great influence on the development of Logic in the Mathematics Department. The award was originally funded by a number of people, including professors in the mathematics and philosophy departments. An in memoriam volume in her honor (Spring Lecture Notes in Mathematics Vol. 492, ed. D.W.Kueker, 1975) contains more information on her life and contributions.
Edgar Krahn Scholarship (Mathematics Competition Scholarship)
The Krahn Scholarship aims to provide financial assistance to worthy students studying mathematics at the University of Maryland. Recipients are selected by the Department of Mathematics on the basis of performance in the University of Maryland High School Mathematics Competition.
The Krahn Scholarships are funded from the Edgar Krahn Scholarship endowment. This endowment was established in honor of the mathematician Edgar Krahn (1894-1961), who played a significant role in the development of mathematics in Estonia, and made research contributions in diverse areas including differential geometry, probability, gas dynamics and elasticity. A centenary volume in his honor contains more information on his life and contributions (see "Edgar Krahn, 1894 -1961. A centenary volume." Edited by Ulo Lumiste and Jaak Peetre. IOS Press, Amsterdam; a copublication with the Estonian Mathematical Society, Tartu, 1994. ISBN: 90-5199-168-1).
The Edgar Krahn Scholarship endowment was established in 1983 by Dorothee Krahn, the widow of Edgar Krahn. Dorothee Krahn has remained active in the University as a supporter not only of mathematics, but also of the arts.
Outstanding Senior Award
The Outstanding Senior Award recognizes the outstanding senior mathematics major.
The award was established in 1993. It is funded by the mathematics department.
Secondary Education - Mathematics Scholarship
This is a merit-based, competitive scholarship whose goal is to support promising students in their pursuit of teaching mathematics in secondary school.
This award was established in 2002. It is funded by the contributions of Denny and Frances Gulick, faculty in the Mathematics Department. The scholarship aims to support promising students in their pursuit of teaching mathematics in secondary school.
Strauss Scholarship
The Strauss Scholarship is awarded to a math major with exceptional ability and interest in mathematics.
The scholarship, first awarded in 1989, is named after Ron Strauss, a professor in the Mathematics Department who after an earlier research career in dynamical systems turned with great energy and dedication to education and the history of mathematics. He died in 1978 while serving as Undergraduate Chair of the Mathematics Department.
Strauss Teaching Assistantships
The Strauss Teaching Assistanships are awarded to strong, advanced math majors with excellent teaching ability. Each winner serves as a Teaching Assistant in a section of calculus in the fall and in the spring semester. Interested students apply the previous spring and compete for these assistantships. (See the official listings for more details on amounts and conditions.) The winners are paid at the rate a graduate student in mathematics would be paid to teach the section.
For strong math majors, the Mathematics Department encourages mathematics research activity (for example, through the Math 489 "research interaction teams") and in some cases graduate coursework in mathematics. Students with definite arrangements for such activity while Strauss TAs will be given preference in the spring competition.
Dan Sweet Memorial Fellowship.
The Dan Sweet Memorial Fellowship is awarded to a full-time student and mathematics major with interests in Applied Mathematics.
This fellowship, originally named Dan Sweet Scholarship, was first awarded in 2005. It is named after Dan Sweet, a professor in the Mathematics Department who served as director of the applied mathematics program and was for many years recognized as one of the very best teachers in the department. Professor Sweet died in 2004.
In Fall 2006 this scholarship was renamed the Daniel Sweet Memorial Fellowship. The fellowship is administered by the Norbert Wiener Center for Harmonic Analysis and Applications.
The John and Sabrina Kontner Endowed Scholarship
The Kontner Award is made to undergraduate mathematics majors who have expressed interest in the applications of mathematics to the solution of real world problems in business and industry.
The award was established in 2011 by John and Sabrina Kontner. John received his Bachelors degree from the University in 1984 and his Masters in Mathematics in 1988. Sabrina received her Bachelors degree from the University in 1992.
The Dan Shanks Award
The Dan Shanks Award is made to undergraduate students studying computational number theory and related areas.
The award was established in 2012 by Jim Owings, a former professor in the Mathematics Department, in memory of Dan Shanks (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Shanks), a well-known computational number theorist who worked at the University after retiring from the Naval Ordnance Laboratory and the National Bureau of Standards.