KINGSTON, RI – March 19, 2025—The URI Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) hosted its inaugural event on February 3, with guest speaker Dr. Sarah Olson, a URI alum.

The AWM was founded in 1971 by a group of women mathematicians to promote gender equality and equal opportunity in the mathematics field. It now has over 100 chapters worldwide. Once student interest became prominent, the organization came to URI in 2024.

“It is actually something that we have been discussing as a department for a while,” faculty advisor Irma Stevens said. “I was part of the organization as an undergrad, so I was aware of the benefits of having something like this on campus.”

The URI chapter began as a small group of graduate students and has since established itself as an official chapter at the university. The group’s inaugural event was advertised to all undergraduate and graduate students to promote inclusivity and diversity of interest within the field.

URI alumni Dr. Sarah Olson attended the event as a guest speaker. She delivered her talk, “Modeling the Dynamics of Centrosome Movement,” which covered her career trajectory and computational biology research with cancer cells.

“She is the first female department head at her current institution, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, and we wanted to celebrate that,” Stevens said. “It’s a big deal for one of our alumni from our university to reach that level, especially for her being the first one at such a prestigious math institution. So, we thought she was the perfect fit.”

The organization’s next steps include local community outreach events. The chapter is in the beginning stages of planning to teach mathematics lessons at local schools to engage with the younger population of mathematicians.

“It’s an opportunity for us to recognize that there are some wonderful mathematicians in our communities who come from all sorts of backgrounds, and we’re just trying to highlight those experiences,” Stevens said. “We’re trying to bring in as many people as we can into the math world, and we have the opportunity here at the institution to take advantage of the resources that we have in terms of space, our surrounding population, and having students who are exploring what they want to do. Regardless of their background, we’re interested in inspiring them.”

If you are interested in joining this organization, you can find the URI Chapter sign up form and the events/meeting schedule on the AWM website.

This article was written by Erin Malinn, class of 2028.