News Stories
5 Questions with Cobus Swarts
October 24, 2024
The deeper Dr. Cobus Swarts immersed himself in mathematics, the more his passion for the subject intensified. Swarts, a VIU Mathematics Professor and Math Learning Centre Coordinator, started as a sessional instructor at VIU in 2009 and became a professor in 2010. Growing up he was always fascinated by science and engineering. Swarts was born in South Africa, and as an undergraduate student... Read more
VIU professor researching adversarial situations on networks
February 9, 2024
Dr. Melissa Huggan received $147,500 in NSERC grants to pursue her research. Dr. Melissa Huggan, a VIU Math Professor, is studying two-player adversarial games that can be used to model real-life problems. Huggan’s research is in the field of graph theory, which is the study of abstract networks. Examples of networks include webpages with their links, social networks, predator-prey networks and... Read more
5 Questions with Melissa Huggan
May 31, 2023
Dr. Melissa Huggan, a Vancouver Island University (VIU) Math Professor, received the 2022 Kirkman Medal from the Institute of Combinatorics and its Applications (ICA). The award recognizes excellent research by fellows or associate fellows of the ICA early in their research careers. “She is a leader in her profession, distinguishing herself in organizing conferences, mathematical outreach and... Read more
Women of STEM
September 18, 2019
The white lab coat and plastic eye protection glasses may not have changed in the past two or three decades, but who is wearing them has. The number of women entering science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) careers has increased in recent years, but not enough. What needs to be done to ensure the increasing number of women accessing STEM education translates into more gender... Read more
Nanaimo High School Wins Prestigious Pi Cup
May 10, 2019
Top math students in grades eight to 12 in the mid-Vancouver Island area competed in the annual BC Secondary School Math Contest held at VIU. Two teams representing Dover Bay Secondary School in Nanaimo took home the coveted Pi Cup trophy in the 25th annual BC Secondary School Math Contest held at Vancouver Island University (VIU). The top 83 math students: 45 juniors and 38 seniors from 11... Read more