January 17, 2009

To Whom It May Concern:

My name is Kevin Murphy and I am a senior here at SUNY Geneseo. I am writing this letter in support of future offerings of the “Topics in Math: Wavelets” course as taught by Professor Haddad. The wavelets course was one of, if not the most interesting and exciting math course that I have taken at SUNY Geneseo. Besides being able to build upon prior knowledge as well as obtaining new knowledge, the course allowed us as students to enter into a process of discovery through applied mathematics.

I was blessed to be one of the students who attended the conference that brought Professor Van Fleet, the author of the textbook, to Geneseo the semester prior to the wavelets course. Because of the interest I developed in the subject of wavelets as a result of attending that conference, when I learned of the course offering I couldn’t wait to jump at the opportunity to take the course, and I was not disappointed. Professor Haddad’s visible excitement about and interest in the subject only added to the course offering. We were a small group of students, but we all worked hard and learned a lot. In addition to the homework assignments and labs that were assigned, the final project gave us an opportunity to demonstrate to ourselves, our peers, and other members of the SUNY Geneseo community what we learned and had been excited about for those 15 weeks.

As someone who is a music enthusiast and aspiring music producer, it was exciting to be able to apply some of the tools that we learned in the wavelets course to the field of audio production, specifically the manipulation of sound using digital filters. There is a growing interest and use of wavelets in the field of audio restoration to bring clarity to recordings that have previously been barely “listenable”. It is amazing what is being done with wavelets in the fields of audio, image compression, pattern detection, and the list goes on. Wavelet theory and application is still in its infancy as a technology, and being on the cutting edge of that is an opportunity that doesn’t happen every day. When I took the course, the course offering and even the textbook were brand new. I can’t even imagine what the educational opportunities are for the course just a short time later, with the developments in wavelets since then.

In closing, I would strongly encourage offering the wavelets course again, and even a follow-up course, as there was a lot of material we wanted to cover, but 15 weeks just didn’t allow us the time. If I wasn’t so close to graduation and my time wasn’t so limited because of commuting to Geneseo from Rochester and working as a software engineer almost full-time during the school semester, I would definitely take the follow-up course myself, even though it wouldn’t help me meet my graduation requirements. It would be a great opportunity for other students to experience the excitement and learning that we grew from during those 15 weeks with Professor Haddad in the wavelets course. The wavelets course generated an excitement in me about mathematics unlike anything I had ever known prior to that course, and I hope to be able to pass that type of excitement to my students as a high school math teacher when I graduate from Geneseo.

Warm Regards,

Kevin Murphy,

SUNY Geneseo Class of 2009