Nice article about Urschel at MIT.

[LionJim]

Standard stuff but always good to read of the guy.

He doesn’t have time to watch the NFL nowadays. Reminds me of my time at Maryland, I’m sitting in class and my professor comes in. “Hey, Jim, good Redskins game yesterday. Did you watch it?” “Yeah, good game, good win.” “You need to understand that you’re not good enough a mathematician to watch NFL games, or any TV, for that matter.” Lol.

‘I missed talking math with people’: why John Urschel left the NFL for MIT

The former Baltimore Ravens guard had a lucrative career in professional football. But he chose to concentrate on his first love in academia

www.theguardian.com

 

[SleepyLion]

Standard stuff but always good to read of the guy.

He doesn’t have time to watch the NFL nowadays. Reminds me of my time at Maryland, I’m sitting in class and my professor comes in. “Hey, Jim, good Redskins game yesterday. Did you watch it?” “Yeah, good game, good win.” “You need to understand that you’re not good enough a mathematician to watch NFL games, or any TV, for that matter.” Lol.

‘I missed talking math with people’: why John Urschel left the NFL for MIT

The former Baltimore Ravens guard had a lucrative career in professional football. But he chose to concentrate on his first love in academia

www.theguardian.com

OT (a bit)....
Did you hear or notice that May 5 was square root day?
When I heard this I thought @LionJim knew this.

May 5, 2025 -> 05/05/25 -> 5²=25.
This only happens 9 times a century. Also, 2025 is a perfect square so this is even more rare.

 

[LionJim]

OT (a bit)....
Did you hear or notice that May 5 was square root day?
When I heard this I thought @LionJim knew this.

May 5, 2025 -> 05/05/25 -> 5²=25.
This only happens 9 times a century. Also, 2025 is a perfect square so this is even more rare.

Heard about it, waited until you posted to get the whole picture. Appreciated.

 

[BobPSU92]

OT (a bit)....
Did you hear or notice that May 5 was square root day?
When I heard this I thought @LionJim knew this.

May 5, 2025 -> 05/05/25 -> 5²=25.
This only happens 9 times a century. Also, 2025 is a perfect square so this is even more rare.

(I contributed to a MATHS. thread!

)

 

[laKavosiey-st lion]

2s looking at that business school

 

[Nittering Nabob]

2s looking at that business school

What other schools is 2 looking at and what is the total price tag for getting one from a top tier university?

 

[laKavosiey-st lion]

What other schools is 2 looking at and what is the total price tag for getting one from a top tier university?

The price tag goes up for us and down for him the more we speak on it. PENN is 1 so he can stay in Philly (there’s a girl)

 

[s1uggo72]

Standard stuff but always good to read of the guy.

He doesn’t have time to watch the NFL nowadays. Reminds me of my time at Maryland, I’m sitting in class and my professor comes in. “Hey, Jim, good Redskins game yesterday. Did you watch it?” “Yeah, good game, good win.” “You need to understand that you’re not good enough a mathematician to watch NFL games, or any TV, for that matter.” Lol.

‘I missed talking math with people’: why John Urschel left the NFL for MIT

The former Baltimore Ravens guard had a lucrative career in professional football. But he chose to concentrate on his first love in academia

www.theguardian.com

visiting Prof at Swarthmore she said every class wound start with somebody going math....John Urschel here...but no audio there is a whole series for anyone who wants to brush up......

 

[LionJim]

visiting Prof at Swarthmore she said every class wound start with somebody going math....John Urschel here...but no audio there is a whole series for anyone who wants to brush up......

One nice thing about teaching math is that you’re always getting better at explaining things. There’s always a better way. Swarthmore has a professor who was at Maryland with me, crazy smart, dynamics.

 

[s1uggo72]

One nice thing about teaching math is that you’re always getting better at explaining things. There’s always a better way. Swarthmore has a professor who was at Maryland with me, crazy smart, dynamics.

I havent figured this one out, she was a visiting Prof at Williams and Swarthmore, but now teaches at Phillips Exeter, which I consider a step down (college vs HS) I wonder why?

Diana Davis | Mathematician

 

[LionJim]

I havent figured this one out, she was a visiting Prof at Williams and Swarthmore, but now teaches at Phillips Exeter, which I consider a step down (college vs HS) I wonder why?

Diana Davis | Mathematician

Simple answer: not good enough. Her advisor was Richard Evan Schwartz, a superstar. You have to be crazy good to get tenure nowadays. Why give someone tenure if there’s someone just out of a post-doc who is just as good? It used to be much easier.

 

[LionJim]

Simple answer: not good enough. Her advisor was Richard Evan Schwartz, a superstar. You have to be crazy good to get tenure nowadays. Why give someone tenure if there’s someone just out of a post-doc who is just as good? It used to be much easier.

Also, in the past colleges would put up with meh teaching, those days are over. I had superb teachers at Maryland, wow, what a privilege.

 

[s1uggo72]

Also, in the past colleges would put up with meh teaching, those days are over. I had superb teachers at Maryland, wow, what a privilege.

IDK, from her youtubes she seems pretty good to me, maybe not Swarthmore good, but certainly good enough for , as Joe put it, that prep school up the river, Bucknell . She seems to have a long resume or whatever you academics call it.

 

[LionJim]

IDK, from her youtubes she seems pretty good to me, maybe not Swarthmore good, but certainly good enough for , as Joe put it, that prep school up the river, Bucknell . She seems to have a long resume or whatever you academics call it.

By not good enough, I meant not good enough in research. Yeah, she seems pretty good as a teacher but good teachers are a dime a dozen. Nowadays faculty like her are hired as non-tenure track faculty.

 

[s1uggo72]

By not good enough, I meant not good enough in research. Yeah, she seems pretty good as a teacher but good teachers are a dime a dozen. Nowadays faculty like her are hired as non-tenure track faculty.

so nobody wants to learn about bumper pool?

 

[LionJim]

so nobody wants to learn about bumper pool?

Billiards in mathematics is all the rage nowadays. Maryam Mirzakhani won the Fields Medal in 2014 for this stuff. RIP, died of cancer in 2017. Mirzakhani’s advisor was Curt McMullen, who himself has a Fields. He would say, “I was always flattered that she’d talk to me as if she thought I could understand what she was saying.” Crazy brilliant, a legendary thesis, up there with Tate’s, Serre’s, John Thompson’s.

 

[Pennstatel0]

OB once told this story when he was coach circa 2013.
They had a whiteboard for spring practice. If a players name was in black, he was full go, blue meant limited contact, red meant he had class, green meant he had a personal excuse.

Urschell‘s name was in purple , and OB asked “wtf does purple mean?”

”Oh, he’s teaching a class”