Individual Nomination

University Of Iowa, Iowa City IA

Investigators

Abstract

PHILIP KUTZKO University of Iowa Dr. Philip Kutzko has been a leader, in the Department of Mathematics, at the University of Iowa, at the three Iowa Regents Universities and nationally, in the effort to increase the participation of groups that are underrepresented in STEM fields. Dr. Kutzko's specific focus is underrepresented minority doctoral students. He was among the initial group to conceive and implement the Department?s ongoing project to build an inclusive and diverse graduate program. Dr. Kutzko finds that community building is equally important to mentoring; as mentoring will foster mentoring, building community will foster support to strengthen students in their pursuits. He feels that it is only by institutionalizing the values of mentoring in the context of a welcoming and inclusive department, or discipline, or university that one might hope to transform these institutions so that changes transcend the efforts of individuals and become permanent. In 2000, Dr. Kutzko wrote the proposal that resulted in the Department of Mathematics becoming designated a Sloan Minority Scholarship Department. This designation resulted in a total of fourteen of the department's minority students receiving Sloan Scholarships as they passed their Comprehensive Exams. Indeed, all of the recent Ph.D.?s have been Sloan Scholars. Dr. Kutzko has mentored at least twenty minority students in the Department. Three of these students have earned the doctoral degree and are employed as faculty or postdoctoral fellows. Dr. Kutzko founded and co-Directs the National Alliance for Doctoral Studies in the Mathematical Sciences, an NSF-sponsored partnership of math sciences departments at the Iowa Regents Universities and Mathematics departments at approximately twenty minority serving institutions. He serves as the Iowa Regents mentor at Florida A&M University and has mentored 21 students there. Dr. Kutzko has served as a consultant to several math departments who are interested in building programs that emulate the community based, mentor intensive strategies of the department at Iowa.