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John Fink at the math faculty workshop in Manuela Cañizares, one of the oldest public schools in Quito. |
John Fink, a mathematician and professor at Kalamazoo College, came to Ecuador to teach Linear Algebra at Universidad San Francisco de Quito (USFQ), a four-year private college in Ecuador. He enjoyed a weekly colloquium with his “well trained, young, enthusiastic” colleagues, and was impressed with their dedication to improving mathematics education in the public schools.
Fink also felt the need to involve himself in the community. Using his experience in service learning at a middle school in Kalamazoo, he developed a program to help improve the math skills of the students at Colegio Quitumbe, a public school in the south of Quito.
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John Fink with junior and senior science students at Eloy Alfaro, a public school just north of Quito’s airport. |
He worked with a team of students from USFQ to enrich the sixth, seventh and eighth graders’ education in mathematics and science. Fink believes that these years "... are critical for education in science, engineering, and technology...My students from the University who tutor these children serve as role models for them, providing what may be their first experience with the possibilities available to them after the bachillerato."
Fink also involved himself in teacher training, helping to organize a weekly Professional Development Workshop held on the campus of USFQ. Each Saturday morning about twenty teachers from Quitumbe would come now come to USFQ for a two-hour class in English, followed by a one-hour class in mathematics or science. This arrangement continued for the rest of the academic year.
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Workshop conversation |
“The work I did in Ecuador has taught me much about what I can do in this country” to address problems in mathematics education, Fink commented. He also remained in touch with colleagues in Ecuador, and in spring 2007 returned to the Universidad San Francisco de Quito on a Fulbright Senior Specialist grant to give a 32 – hour workshop for high school teachers of calculus, held in eight four-hour workshops on Friday afternoons and Saturday mornings in March.
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Workshop participants on the last day |
In each four-hour meeting they worked through a several concrete activities organized around one of the central ideas of calculus, in order to give the teachers projects and activities that they could use with their own calculus students. Although about fifteen participants had been expected, the number had grown to more than thirty by the time Dr. Fink arrived, with about ten more on a waiting list. “The dedication and commitment that this represents is truly impressive,” said Fink. “These teachers are my heroes!”
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