College of Natural Sciences Faculty Council Election (2024-2026)

Effective this fall I will be promoted to Professor of Instruction in the Department of Mathematics. Over the past six years in rank as Associate Professor of Instruction, I have taught 1,602 students in NSC 110H Mathematics for Human Flourishing, M 302 Introduction to Mathematics, M 325K Discrete Mathematics, M 329F Theory of Interest, M 339D Introduction to Financial Mathematics for Actuaries, and M 175T Being You in Mathematics. Currently, I serve on committees at the departmental, college, and university levels including chairing the Mathematics Undergraduate Studies Committee, co-founding and serving on the Mathematics Department Professional Track Faculty Chair’s Committee, the CNS College Readiness Committee, CNS Outreach Committee, and CNS Representative to Faculty Council. In recent semesters I have been excited to be part of undergraduate education here at UT through my service on committees including Chairing C-1 Admissions & Registration, C-3 Undergraduate Curriculum Changes, and C-4 Educational Policy Committee. Moreover, in the past, I have served on the CNS Service Courses Committee, the Mathematics Core Curriculum Assessment Committee, CNS Student Mental Health Task Force, and the Quantitative Reasoning Flag Committee. For the past decade, I have served UT as the Undergraduate Mathematics Faculty Advisor. In 2012, I co-founded UT’s chapter of the Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) and am presently serving as the faculty sponsor. I have decades of mathematics communication and outreach experience with schools, museums, and community groups. On the state level, I am active with the San Antonio-COMmunity for Mathematics Inquiry in Teaching (SA-COMMIT) and in the summer of 2023, I served as a mathematics content creator for a project with the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB) titled Digital Design for Student Success: College Readiness (D2S2). On the national level, beginning in the summer of 2023, I am serving as a Content Creator and Working Group Member on the three-year project Developing Teaching Materials Supporting Ethical Reasoning Skill Development Across Undergraduate Mathematics Curriculum which is supported by the Framing Mathematics as a Foundation for Ethical STEM NSF Grant.

I am an Associate Professor with a research active lab and a strong commitment to teaching and mentoring. I served in multiple Departmental and University-level committees both here and at my previous institution and was elected to the executive committee for the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center at Duke University. In every position of leadership I have held I have taken special care to listen to my colleagues' opinions and to make informed and data-driven decisions that consider not just our immediate needs but also the overall mission and vision of our institution and the wellbeing of our community.

I am in my fourth year as an Assistant Professor of Practice in the Freshman Research Initiative and a Research Scientist in the Department of Integrative Biology. I am motivated to run for the faculty council because I believe in advocating for equitable treatment and representation of all faculty members—especially contingent "professional track" faculty who often lack the rights and responsibilities afforded to their tenure-track counterparts—because temporary faculty appointments have negative consequences for student learning and the academic enterprise. I am committed to raising awareness about these disparities and ensuring all voices within the UT community are heard and valued. If elected, I will work to promote policies and initiatives that recognize and respect the contributions of contingent faculty, fostering a more inclusive, collaborative, and supportive environment for all faculty members to enhance student success.

I am a professor in the Department of Nutritional Sciences. I conduct cell and animal research on the mechanistic roles that vitamin D plays in biological systems. I have previously run an interdisciplinary graduate program and been involved in graduate and undergraduate curriculum development.

I am happy to be considered for election to Faculty Council. I have previously served the University as an elected member of Faculty Council, Faculty Council Executive Committee, and Graduate Assembly and as Chair of the latter. I also have served on or chaired 8 faculty committees (A1, A2, A3, A5, A6, C10, C11, and C12). I am a champion of interdisciplinary research in my roles as the Director of the Population Research Center in the College of Liberal Arts (which serves faculty in 17 departments across campus including three CNS departments) and as the Amy Johnson McLaughlin Centennial Professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Sciences in the College of Natural Sciences.

Throughout my time at UT Austin, I have enjoyed and continue to value all three roles asked of faculty members on campus. I have won teaching awards for my undergraduate teaching and served as the Associate Chair of Undergraduate Education in my department (Human Development and Family Sciences) as well as Associate Director of Undergraduate Education in The School of Human Ecology. In addition, I maintain an active research lab focused on the how couples successfully navigate important life events such as the transition to parenthood and the transition to an empty nest.

I am an evolutionary neuroscientist and have been a member of the Faculty Council for eight of the past twelve years, serving on numerous committees, including as chair of the Academic Calendar Committee and (currently) as Chair-Elect of the Faculty Grievance Committee. I have taught undergraduate and graduate courses since my arrival at UT Austin in 2006, leading the transformation of the large enrollment Introductory Biology Laboratory Course from 2010 through 2016. Finally, I created the bioinformatics training program and established the bioinformatics consulting group, which is now part of the Center of Biomedical Research Support, which I led for two years as its founding director.

I have been a UT faculty member for over 40 years, and was the founding Director of the UT Artificial Intelligence Lab. I have previously served on the Faculty Council and Transportation Policies Committee. My subversive organization memberships include ACLU and Sierra Club.

I am currently an Assistant Professor of Instruction in BIO and MBS, teaching Intro Bio (I and II), as well as the upper-division course General Microbiology. Within these departments, I chair committees on student community engagement and faculty professional development, and belong to additional committees on community wellness. I am also a member of the CNS Professional Track Faculty Committee, a group that seeks to promote and support the contributions of PTF faculty to the college. I believe the experience and connectivity garnered from these positions prepares me to step into a University level role in representing, and championing the interests of my fellow faculty.

I have represented CNS and the math department on FC, on UGSAC, and on the EPC, including chairing the EPC. My focus has always been on educational issues, doing right by our students, while trying to defuse conflicts that arise. I am a faculty Director of the UT Coop and recently served on the committee advising the President and Provost on the dean search for the School of Civic Leadership.

Paul R. Shapiro is The Frank N. Edmonds, Jr. Regents Professor in Astronomy at The University of Texas at Austin, member of UT Astronomy and Physics Dept. Graduate Studies Committees, affiliate of The Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences, and founding member of the Texas Cosmology Center and its successor, the Texas Center for Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics (TCCAP) in the new Weinberg Institute. He received his Astronomy A.B. (Summa Cum Laude, 1974) and Ph.D. (1979) from Harvard, and was postdoc at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton (1978-1980), before joining the UT Astronomy faculty (1981 - present). Among honors since received are the Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship in Physics (1984-1988), UT Astronomy BoV Teaching Excellence Award (1988), National Chair of Excellence, Institute of Astronomy, UNAM, Mexico (1997), John W. Cox Fellowship for Advanced Study in Astronomy, UT (2004-2006), and NSF TeraGrid '08 Award for pioneering massively-paralleled supercomputer simulation of cosmic reionization. In 2011, Shapiro was elected Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS). His citation reads, "For outstanding contributions to astrophysics and cosmology which advanced our understanding of cosmic reionization, structure formation, gas dynamics, dark matter and dark energy, the interstellar and intergalactic media, and topics from supernova polarization to relativistic shocks." With over 290 publications in theoretical astrophysics, he has been PI on numerous NASA, NSF, and DOE grants. Shapiro has served on NASA and NSF advisory panels and numerous SOCs, and as co-organizer of the Cosmological Radiative Transfer Comparison Project (2008 -2012) and PI of The Cosmic Dawn Project (2012 – present). In 2013, he was elected to Chair the American Physical Society (APS) Division of Astrophysics (DAP), serving in the Chair-line (2013 – 2017) and as Chair of DAP Nominating Committee (2017). At UT, Shapiro previously represented CNS on the UT Faculty Council, serving multiple terms, separated in time, and also served on other UT and CNS faculty committees over the years, including, e.g. Computer, FRA Selection. As teacher, Shapiro developed new graduate courses and curriculum in Astronomy, and, in 2011, joined the UT Freshman Research Initiative (FRI) program to create a highly successful research stream in computational cosmology -- “Cosmic Dawn: How the First Galaxies Formed, Ended the Dark Ages, and Reionized the Universe” (2011 – 2014) -- an innovative curriculum to boost underrepresented groups as STEM majors by early research involvement.

My statement about this election:
If elected to serve on the UT Faculty Council, I will bring my 4 decades of experience and knowledge of institutional history at UT, along with my professional leadership experience outside UT, to bear on the critical role the Council plays in representing issues of importance to faculty, students, research and non- research staff, alike, to help steer and advise UT leaders. Whether it is an issue as seemingly small as a change to the annual calendar of class days, or as seemingly out of faculty purview as University- or college-wide policy decisions to centralize administrative or computer staff or reduce libraries, or as deeply-rooted in academic tradition as the protection of freedom of speech and tenure, I will stand up and speak out in defense of our interests and of the long-term health and future of our University. And I will use my time on the Council to alert my faculty colleagues to any issues that come before it, that might affect our professional lives, to give us the chance to influence them, rather than merely “receive” the news, after the fact.