Dean’s Corner section header

Angela Bies, PhD

Associate Dean for Graduate Student Success, UMD School of Public Policy

Angela Bies Headshot

Linda Macri, PhD

Director of Academic and Professional Development and Center for Writing and Oral Communication, UMD Graduate School

Linda Macri Headshot

We are grateful to join this issue of The Calculated Career and to connect with the Math community. Our professional paths have taken us through different disciplines, nonprofit leadership, academic research, teaching, and university administration. These varied experiences shape our values and how we approach graduate education. We have seen that success in graduate school rests not only on strong disciplinary knowledge, but also on the relationships, resources, and resiliencies that enable students to move through their programs with clarity and confidence.

In The Graduate School, we use the idea of Graduate Pathways as a framework for graduate student development. It is not a simple to-do list, but rather a way of foregrounding how goals, scholarly training, professional development, and community interrelate. In practice, this can mean taking time to set and revisit goals, seeking mentors within and beyond your program and UMD, engaging with your field through seminars and professional societies, recognizing the many places where your skills and methods are applied, and practicing how to carry your graduate training into a range of academic and professional roles.

Research on graduate education shows that students benefit when their programs help them understand the milestones ahead, connect with the people and resources that matter, and build habits that support steady progress over time. A large-scale survey of graduate students conducted by Nature in 2025 highlighted that students who experience supervision and mentoring as supportive and respectful are more likely to report wellbeing and achievement in their programs. Wellbeing and academic success often reinforce each other. When students feel supported, connected to their programs and fields, recognize steady progress in coursework or research, and understand the purpose behind their work, they are better positioned to sustain momentum and shape a career path aligned with their goals and interests.

The Graduate School offers programs and resources that reflect this philosophy and are available throughout your time at UMD. These include workshops to reflect on goals, explore career directions, strengthen writing and oral communication, and connect with mentors and peers. We encourage you to explore these opportunities and to choose at least one action this semester that supports your growth — whether meeting with a mentor, attending a workshop, or mapping how your current work connects to the future you are shaping.

Graduate School Resources:

• The Graduate School’s Career and Professional Development Events Calendar
• Sign-up Form for The Graduate School Career & Professional Development Partner’s Newsletter
• Beyond the Professoriate Virtual Learning Platform Guidance
• Register for the 2026 Doctoral Career Pathways Conference

Chris Henderson

Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics, University of Maryland

What inspired you to pursue a career in academia?

My first undergraduate math class, which was also my introduction to proofs, was taught using the Moore method. This meant that the students presented all of the material on the board to each other. Instead of memorizing steps to complete a computation, I had to sit down and learn every bit of the material and how those bits fit together. To me, writing a proof meant understanding precisely why something was true. I got hooked! Math was all that I wanted to think about, and any other career seemed completely out of the question to me.

What specific steps did you take to prepare for and pursue a career in academia?

When I was an undergraduate, I took as many courses as possible, especially graduate level ones. When I got to graduate school, this let me hit the ground running. I spent my first year trying out different advisors through reading courses, and then got to work on a thesis. Even then, I kept taking courses. You never know when a nice idea from a topic's course that you didn't think was relevant to your research will unlock a problem that you have been struggling with for months.

What are the most rewarding aspects of being a professor, and what are some of the challenges?

The moment when you finally grasp the solution to a difficult problem that you have been stuck on for days, weeks, or months is spectacular. The flip side is one of the biggest challenges: we spend most of our research time being completely stuck on a problem!

Another rewarding aspect is working with a student who, after perhaps initially struggling in a course, puts in the hard work and earns an A.

Can you share any advice for students who aspire to become professors?

I have two pieces of advice to share. First, if you want to be a professor, you have to truly love what you are doing. Research is difficult, and you need to be able to maintain a healthy obsession with a problem in order to solve it. Find an area that genuinely pulls you in, that you cannot stop thinking about. Second, talk to as many people as possible. You will find more interesting problems and solutions this way. And you never know when one of those connections will help you get invited to a conference or get your file looked at closely by a hiring committee. Besides, meeting new people is a nice perk of the job.

What are some important skills and qualities that aspiring professors should cultivate?

Friendliness, openness, and hard work. Friendliness and openness will help you make connections with new people that will lead to new and interesting research. By being open to ideas and perspectives beyond those that are standard in your field, you can find novel solutions to difficult problems or discover new avenues of research. Hard work because it is a necessity for doing strong research. Although, you shouldn't drive yourself crazy. Remember to enjoy yourself!

What is something Math Department students might not know about you?

I love bread and pastries! My daughters and I are always on the hunt for new bakeries to try out, and I have recently started baking my own sourdough.

Owen Deen, NASA OSTEM Intern

Applied Mathematics PhD Student, Department of Mathematics, University of Maryland

Deen headshot

How did you find your internship, and what did the application process look like?

I found my internship through the NASA OSTEM website. Unlike many internship programs where you apply to a general posting, NASA OSTEM lists specific projects that students can apply to directly. Each project includes a description of the work, required skills, and the team you would be working with, which made it much easier to find opportunities aligned with my interests.

I applied broadly to projects that genuinely interested me, submitting applications to around 15 different projects. From there, I was invited to participate in a few technical interviews. Ultimately, I was selected for a project that best matched my background and skill set. The process emphasized fit between the student and the project rather than a one-size-fits-all placement, which I found really valuable.

What kinds of projects or responsibilities did you work on, and which technical or mathematical skills did you use most?

During my internship, I worked on deploying a large language model (LLM) to analyze data from the Wide Field Instrument (WFI) for the Roman Space Telescope. This was a research-focused project with a unique set of constraints, including the requirement to use open-source models deployed locally rather than relying on cloud-based solutions.

My research background was especially important because there was no existing blueprint for solving this problem. I helped design an agentic pipeline where one model handled user queries and database interactions, while another model focused on analyzing the scientific data. My mathematical training helped me think abstractly about how to structure the system, reason about the data flow, and verify the correctness and reliability of the analysis outputs.

What new tools, methods, or professional skills did you learn during the internship?

This internship taught me a lot about working in a research center environment and reinforced that this is the type of career I want to pursue after completing my PhD. On the technical side, I gained hands-on experience working with open-source language models under strict data privacy and security constraints.

I also learned how to move beyond proof-of-concept code and build systems that are actually deployable and usable by others. This included thinking carefully about robustness, maintainability, and real-world constraints. Professionally, I learned how to communicate technical ideas across disciplines and collaborate effectively in a research-driven setting.

What advice would you give students currently seeking internships?

My biggest advice is to apply broadly to opportunities that genuinely interest you. For platforms like NASA OSTEM, taking the time to apply to multiple projects can significantly increase your chances, especially since different teams are looking for different skill sets.

I would also encourage students not to overlook smaller companies or organizations. My first internship during undergrad was with Live Oak Bank, and that experience played a major role in preparing me for my work at NASA. Smaller organizations often provide meaningful, hands-on experiences that can be just as valuable as those at large institutions and can help propel you to the next opportunity.

Any last advice for students struggling with finding internship opportunities?

If you are struggling to land an internship, don't get discouraged. The first opportunity can be the hardest to secure, but every experience builds momentum. Focus on developing strong foundational skills, working on projects that interest you, and being open to a wide range of roles and organizations.

Even if an opportunity does not seem like your dream position at first, it can still provide valuable experience and open doors later on. Persistence, curiosity, and a willingness to learn go a long way.

Bright Minds at Work section header

Aditi Sen, Student Research Spotlight

Applied Statistics PhD Student, Department of Mathematics, University of Maryland

Aditi Sen headshot

Last year, I had the great opportunity to present my research article, “Estimation of Finite Population Proportions for Small Areas – A Statistical Data Integration Approach,” which was recently published in the Journal of Survey Statistics and Methodology. This research addressed a key problem in survey statistics and small area estimation. Herein, multiple survey data are integrated to draw inference for the finite population, but at granular levels, which are critical for policy decisions. We proposed a computationally efficient algorithm based on an empirical best prediction and demonstrated our method on predicting voting preference for the US Presidential Election from survey data collected by the Pew Research Center. Owing to this interesting application on election projection and encouragement from my advisor, I submitted our article in the student paper award category of the DC chapter of the American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR). The submission process involved sending the draft paper, along with a letter from my advisor, in November 2024.

In January 2025, I was notified over email by the DC-AAPOR president with the great news that our paper was selected as the student paper award winner. I was invited to give a 20-minute presentation at the 80th AAPOR Annual Conference (2025) in St. Louis, Missouri, in May 2025. This conference is the premier forum for the exchange of advances in public opinion and survey research. I was both excited and nervous about presenting at such a large-scale conference. I prepared a presentation of about 20 slides, emphasizing logical flow and including visuals to clarify statistical concepts so that both specialists and non-specialists could clearly understand our contribution. Condensing technical material to fit time constraints and managing presentation anxiety were the main challenges I faced during preparation. I addressed these challenges by practicing multiple times, both alone and with peers, which helped me calibrate timing, prioritize key takeaways, and treat audience questions as opportunities for discussion.

I was pleasantly surprised by how much audience discussion sharpened my thinking and revealed new perspectives that were not obvious when working alone. Presenting my research led to valuable conversations and created opportunities for future collaborations and interesting datasets. Attending conferences as a graduate student is an enriching experience. At AAPOR, I received constructive feedback and was able to make new connections and actively engage with attendees from diverse disciplines in academia and industry.

My main advice to other graduate students is to start early and become members of communities in their research areas, which opens avenues for student presentation categories at conferences. During presentations, tell a clear story rather than trying to present every detail, and practice with peers beforehand. Treat the presentation not only as a performance but as part of the research process itself, where feedback helps refine ideas. Major conferences also provide student aid — the AAPOR award covered my travel expenses with a cash prize, and I received a plaque. While these formal recognitions are beneficial for students’ profiles and open future career opportunities, the most enduring outcomes are often the informal professional connections and the confidence gained from sharing work with the broader community.

Shashank Sule, Genentech Intern

Applied Mathematics PhD Student, Department of Mathematics, University of Maryland

Shashank Sule headshot

How did you find your internship, and what did the application process look like?

I found my internship in a somewhat unconventional way. I met a postdoc in the Biophysics Department during a Brin Center workshop, and we stayed in touch after she left UMD for the biotech company Genentech. When I was looking for internships for Summer 2025, I reached out to her in October 2024 to ask if her group was seeking interns. She gave me a referral and connected me with several internships in her company, but ultimately, they did not pan out. However, in February, she contacted me about an opening in her group on a numerical analysis project. I was invited for an interview at Genentech, and I got the job!

What kinds of projects or responsibilities did you work on, and which technical or mathematical skills did you use most?

I worked on an exploratory project on a topic closely aligned with my dissertation research — sampling conformational ensembles via molecular dynamics. I was tasked with improving an in-house algorithm with ideas from generative modeling; it involved a mix of math and computation. After setting up the mathematical model for how our new sampling algorithm should look (this happened in the first week), I spent the rest of the time implementing it on a test system. Because I was improving an in-house algorithm, I used an existing codebase in the group to implement this. Everything we did was grounded in machine learning, so I used PyTorch during the internship.

What new tools, methods, or professional skills did you learn during the internship?

Working in a drug discovery group, I learned many things from biophysics and chemistry that were relevant to proteins. This included the very basics (protein chemistry and bonding) to the cutting edge (AlphaFold and Boltz-2). Additionally, I worked with more modern deep learning tools and architectures. I learned how to code equivariant graph neural networks, spatiotemporal graph transformers, experiment tracking with Weights and Biases, and other software development concepts and tools that incorporate one’s internship work into the broader company codebase. The group’s engineering team helped fix any bugs I encountered and helped me plan out my ideas before implementing them in code. I learned a lot about the broader structure and current trends of the biotech industry. My internship colleagues, who were more steeped in the bio and AI space, took me to conferences around San Francisco that involved VCs, startups, and a Nobel Prize winner.

What advice would you give students currently seeking internships?

a. Start planning your internship search/resume/interview preparation about a year before the summer you want to do your internship because this process is like a full-time job itself. Allow ample time to complete the internship search process while simultaneously juggling graduate school. The advantage of starting early is that quant internships begin their application cycle in September/October. When you apply, you sometimes get a coding assessment pretty quickly, and you’ll want to be prepared for it when you get it. Technical interview preparation does take quite a while when you begin from scratch.

b. Go to conferences in subjects you are interested in. Many students find their internships through their advisor or someone they know. To look for math/applied math conferences, check the SIAM/AMS sectional meetings calendar (you can apply for travel funding). Sometimes it helps to just Google “Upcoming conference in {area you’re interested in}”. Keep building your network progressively and don’t be afraid to cold email people in companies that interest you. People are eager to be helpful and often appreciate being contacted.

c. Referrals are king, especially in tech/biotech internships, and can determine whether you get an interview. Ideally, if you see a role in a company where you know someone, get a referral before applying. A caveat: If you see a role in a company where you don’t know someone, apply anyway. More broadly, don’t take too long to apply or update your resume since sometimes job requisitions don’t stay open for long. Perfection is the enemy of good.

Any last advice for students struggling with finding internship opportunities?

a. Treat upskilling like a summer internship. For summer 2025 internships, I had been applying for a while and wasn’t succeeding. Ultimately, what made me feel okay about my summer prospects was that I had a lot of my own projects to do, and if I didn’t get an internship, I could spend that summer doing my own projects and preparing for job interviews much more systematically. This also helped me feel less desperate in the interview process, because now I was weighing internship opportunities against a concrete summer plan I felt good about. On a broader note, getting a summer internship, especially when cold-applying and clearing multiple rounds of interviews, is difficult. Normalize not getting a summer internship (like, do what you need to do for yourself to psychologically get to this place).

b. You can find internships posted on Glassdoor, LinkedIn, and via job fairs (make sure you keep tabs on the UMD Career Center job fairs). The Erdos Institute is also an awesome resource that the UMD Math Department provides. If you are interested in quant internships, you could complete an Erdos quant bootcamp the spring/summer before the year you want to do your internship. The interview prep will be fresh in your mind when you start applying in the fall, and you can use the momentum from your quant interview preparation/experience for applying and interviewing for tech roles whose applications usually follow the quant internships.

Campus Resource Roundup

English Editing for International Graduate Students

English Editing for International Graduate Students (EEIGS) Program

Need help polishing your academic writing in English? The English Editing for International Graduate Students (EEIGS) program offers free, virtual English editing for required academic writing by international graduate students at the University of Maryland.

  • ✍️ Improve grammar, clarity, and academic tone
  • 📝 Receive feedback using Track Changes in Microsoft Word
  • 🌍 Work with trained volunteer editors from UMD
  • ⏱️ Access services year-round with flexible turnaround times

Open to currently enrolled international graduate students at UMD. EEIGS is here to support you every step of the way.

Request Editing Help Learn More

📍 Virtual, asynchronous service

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150th Anniversary Celebration of the Department of Mathematics

April 25, 2026 | 9:00 AM – 3:00 PM

Join the Department of Mathematics in commemorating 150 years of outstanding research, education, and service. The 150th Anniversary Celebration welcomes alumni, students, staff, faculty members, and friends to celebrate our history while networking and sharing stories with fellow Terps.

Admission is free.

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