Dr. Al Vekovius
(aka "Big Al")
Here's the text from an ALMAGEST article about Al.
Dr Vekovius graduated from LSU Baton Rouge in 1973 with a Ph.D in mathematics.
He taught at LSUS from 1973 to 1979 in the mathematics department. He has always wanted to return to academia and has high regard LSUS for its faculty and students.
When he left LSUS in 1979, it was to join the faculty at LSU Medical School in Shreveport as the Biometry teacher and head of the Academic Computing section at the School. He taught medical students and graduate students there until 1983 when he left to start Softdisk Publishing, a computer software business, with other partners. He remained on the adjunct faculty at the med school for about ten years.
He is married to the former Gay Tate of Louisville, KY. Gay is Associate Professor of Audiology at LSU Medical School in the Department of Communication Disorders.
He has two children: Bryan J. Vekovius, MD, a second-year resident in the Department of Opthamology at LSUMC-S, and Stephen Vekovius, a Microsoft Certified Software Engineer who works for EDS in Shreveport. Both boys attended LSUS and both graduated from Louisiana Tech.
His interests include fly-fishing, trying flies, bass fishing, exercise, and foreign languages. Dr Vekovius just completed two years of Japanese with Mieko Peek in the LSUS Foreign Languages Department.
On what makes a successful teacher he says:
1. Make it clear what is expected of the student to make an A. Keep reinforcing an A as the target grade.
2. Have enthusiasm for the material your are teaching, and know it cold.
3. Prepare and plan. Don't wing it.
4. Test and retest. I give a weekly quiz which serves as a learning experience and a measure of my own effectiveness more than it does a test from which to obtain a grade.
5. Innovate often. Keep trying new techniques.
6. Challenge the students to solve problems themselves.
Mathematics instruction has advanced in the past twenty years. The LSUS has a faculty with very capable, bright energetic people who expend enormous effort to make mathematics accessible and useful to LSU students. This includes faculty who are innovative in the areas of computer labs and other teaching research.