A Wandering Mind
The walls of Dr. Mark Ravaglia’s classroom are mostly bare, dominated by large dry-erase boards that are covered in notes and equations for his Algebra students and a few hastily-drawn bell curves to illustrate concepts for his AP Statistics class. The furnishings are sparse: a modest desk, rows of chairs, a projector, and a large filing cabinet covered with colorful puzzles and mind games, including a 5-by-5 square Rubik’s cube. To the casual observer, this is a standard mathematics classroom. Upon closer inspection, however, a more nuanced picture begins to emerge. His walls are adorned with posters of artistic masterpieces: Raphael’s School of Athens and Bruegel’s Hunters in the Snow. These hint at not only philosophical sophistication, but also the commonplace contentment of Bruegel’s genre painting. These, just as much as the math problems scribbled on the board, define Ravaglia’s life and teaching.
“I was equally interested in humanities and math in high school,”Ravaglia states. “And in college I studied stuff that seemed interesting.” For him, this meant a degree in Symbolic Systems from Stanford University, a major he described as a combination of psychology, philosophy, linguistics, and computer science. “I still wanted to study more things,” he explained cheerily, in his characteristically plainspoken manner.
Following his undergraduate work, Ravaglia traveled to Germany to study for a year under a D.A.D., the German equivalent of a Fullbright Scholarship. His work centered on the history and philosophy of mathematics, but he also learned much about the intellectual community of Europe. “I once attended a conference by a Russian speaker, speaking to a German audience in English.” Ravalgia says. “People would ask him questions in whatever language was best for their question, and he would reply in whatever language seemed best for his answer. It showed me that it’s really the underlying issues that are important, not how you ask the question.”
Ravaglia carried these lessons with him to Carnegie Mellon, where he continued his studies, eventually earning his Ph.D. He struggles to explain his work there in comprehensible terms, mentioning concepts like “foundations for mathematics” and “pragmatic notions of infinity” that do little to clarify anything other than his impressive academic credentials. Nevertheless, he never drifts into arrogance or self-promotion; he is on a simple quest for true understanding, with all the glamour of Bruegel’s hunters following their dogs home.
Even at HPA, Ravaglia never stops learning. “It’s impossible to teach perfectly,” he admits. “Teaching is interesting because it’s not really about the content. It’s really about the structures and methods that you use to communicate with the students.” As his students know, “Dr. R” has a charmingly personal communication style. He walks about the classroom while he lectures, rubbing his white-board markers between his hands. He speaks simply. When asked a question, he often will remain silent for a few moments, before replying with a carefully phrased sentence or two that can capture a complex concept in clear, incisive language.
While Ravaglia’s room is in the math building, his students understand that no subject is off limits. “I smuggle in history and science,” Ravaglia chuckles. “English papers and mathematical proofs are somewhat the same structurally, and you diagram sentences for English, but it’s also useful for understanding equations.” Like the Renaissance men and Greek philosophers on his poster, Ravaglia refuses to abide by what he sees as insignificant differences between disciplines. “If you want to have a good history discussion, you need to talk about psychology and statistics and then you begin to see that the divisions between the buildings are not that important.
“Voltaire wrote that one should ‘tend your own garden.’ This is a nice garden,” Ravaglia remarks, explaining the personal philosophy that fuels his commitment to HPA. “If I was just a math teacher, this wouldn’t be satisfying, but I like to push myself. I coach. I work in the dorm. I swim. I run. I’m trying to do a four-hour marathon. I love that I can take [my 13-month-old daughter] to track practice with me or go for a run or walk to the pool.”
Hawai‘i, too, has a strong appeal for Ravaglia. “There are certain things, like the notion of playing outdoors and staying in shape, that are normal here,” he explains. “Here, you’re in the country, but it’s still open to new ideas.” For a man who has spent his life in pursuit of knowledge, this is indeed an important matter.
[MKK Summer 2009]
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Story by Will Sims ‘09
