History of Arnold Ross and his Program

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History of Arnold Rossand his Program

• Arnold Ephraim Ross (1906 - 2002)
• Born in Chicago 1906
• Odessa 1909 - 1924

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• Born in Chicago 1906
• Odessa 1909 - 1924 S. O. Shatunovsky
• Returned to Chicago 1924
• University of Chicago E. H. Moore
• L. E Dickson

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• Ph.D. in 1931
• On Representation of Integers by Indefinite
  Ternary Quadratic Forms.

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• Married Bee Horecker 1931.

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1940s

• After some postdoc positions,
• Ross earned tenure at St. Louis University.

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Notre Dame

• Hired as Head of the Math Department at the
  University of Notre Dame in 1947.
• Began a summer program for in-service high school
  math teachers in 1947.
• Mentored some talented young students.

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Origins of Ross Program

• 1947 - 1956 Teachers
• 1957 Students observed by teachers.
• Later years More students, and ran a Sunday
  school during the year.

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Teaching styles

• Textbooks
• Definition
• Theorem
• Proof
• Applications (examples)

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Teaching styles

• Textbooks
• Definition
• Theorem
• Proof
• Applications (examples)

• Ross
• Examples
• Conjectures
• Theorem
• Generalization
• Definition

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Ross Problem sets

• Numerical Problems (Some food for thought)
• PODASIPs
• Exploration
• Techniques of Generalization

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Ohio State

• Moved to OSU in 1963
• First summer program here in 1964.
• Boom times for science education,
• large enrollments.

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MOTTOS

• From the beginning, Rosss motto was
• Think deeply of simple things.
• From the Prologue
• A neat formulation of results is the end
  product of understanding.
• All too often we present to the novice the
  result of someone elses successful struggle for
  understanding, in the forlorn hope that this may
  provide an easy way out.

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Retirement 1976

• Arnold Ross stepped down as chair.
• But he wanted his Program to continue, following
  the same teaching methods.

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Moving the Program (1970s)

• India (P. Bambah)
• Germany (P. Roquette)
• Australia (K. Mahler)
• University of Chicago (F. Browder) 1975 -
  1979
• Restart at Ohio State 1979

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Bee Ross

• For all those years, Bee was a great supporter of
  Arnolds projects.

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1980s

• Bee Ross suffered a long decline,
• died in 1983.
• Arnold continued to lecture every summer.
  Gloria Woods organized things.Several OSU
  faculty taught summer courses.

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• Late 1980s Alumni started new programs Glenn
  Stevens (PROMYS)
• Max Warshauer (Honors Math Camp)
• General feeling Ross Program would fade.

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Madeleine Ross

• A surprise announcement in 1990.
• Arnold became more involved in running the Ross
  Young Scholars Program.

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1996 Reunion-Conference

• Celebrating Arnolds 90th birthday.
• Fundraising concerns.

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Transition

• Ross stepped down in August 2000.
• 95th Birthday Reunion-Conference 2001.
• Arnold Ross died September 25, 2002.

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New generation Changes?

• Some traditions from early days have been lost.
• New traditions have begun.
• Others have stayed unchanged.

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UNCHANGED key components

• Number Theory - with enough time to work.
• Hard problem sets, with many threads.
• Community - students working together.
• Counselors - most important piece. They
  make the Program succeed.

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Think deeply of simple things