"What he did was directly tackle the problem of demand, have the students understand that systems have prevented their access to mathematics, and have them demand algebra from school boards that have denied it to them," said Phillip Uri Treisman, a calculus professor at the University of Texas who is a national leader in efforts to improve minority students' performance in math and science.
I loved the college environment, the freedom, and the intellectual people, and I learned that I loved mathematics--thanks to an inspirational calculus professor.
-- my family, what with the token electrical engineer, the business analyst and the Calculus professor, has always been nimble with their numbers.
Matthew Denhart, administrative director of the College Affordability center, conveyed the findings using this calculus: "Professors with tenure make more money; the more a professor teaches the more money he or she makes; and the professors that bring in research money get paid more than those who do not".
A third idea sent Tintin and Professor Calculus to a snow-covered polar region, where a stranded group of explorers need Calculus to save them from food poisoning.
Concerned, Tintin, Haddock, and their friend Professor Calculus visit Calculus's old friend Professor Hercules Tarragon, the only expedition member yet to be affected.
In Hergé's Tintin, for example, Professor Calculus is hard of hearing.
And his grandfather Auguste – the inspiration for Professor Calculus in Hergé's Tintin comic books – set records for exploring the highest reaches of the Earth's atmosphere in his pressurised gondola balloon.
Yves was a distinguished nuclear physicist, an austere intellectual whose remoteness was accentuated by deafness (he was allegedly one of the models of Hergé's eccentric Professor Calculus in the Tintin books).
For all the variety in the stories, though, there is also a formulaic similarity, with the same supporting characters reliably turning up: Captain Haddock, a blustering, alcoholic sea captain; Professor Calculus, an absent-minded, hard-of-hearing scientist; Thompson and Thomson, bumbling, look-alike, bowler-hatted detectives; the beak-nosed, shrill-voiced diva Bianca Castafiore.
Farr is probably the most prolific figure, having published over a dozen books on Tintin (among them "Tintin: The Complete Companion" and a number of short studies of individual characters such as Snowy, Captain Haddock, and Professor Calculus), several translations, and a biography of Hergé.
