About me

me

D. Sean Fitzpatrick

Department of Mathematics and Computer Science
University of Lethbridge
Email: sean.fitzpatrick@uleth.ca

I am an instructor in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at the University of Lethbridge. My main job is the teaching of undergraduate mathematics courses, but I also do a lot of work on Open Education Resource development. I've adpoted and edited open textbooks covering our entire calculus sequence, and I'm also the adminstrator for our WeBWorK online homework server, which provides computer-graded online homework for courses in Mathematics, Physics, and Statistics.

I began at U of L as contract faculty in 2014, and graduated to a continuing position the following year. Prior to my arrival in Lethbridge, I held the following positions:

  • 2013-2014: Postdoctoral Fellow, Western University. (With Matthias Franz and Masoud Khalkali)
  • 2012-2013: Lecturer in Mathematics, University of California, Berkeley.
  • 2010-2012: NSERC Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California, Berkeley. (With Alan Weinstein)
  • 2009-2010: Assistant Professor (contract), Mount Allison University.

PreTeXt, and open textbooks

PreTeXt is an XML-based language for authoring open textbooks. Books written in PreTeXt can be produced in a variety of formats, including HTML, PDF, EPUB, and Braille. The HTML format allows us to produce books with a variety of interactive features, such as videos, interactive homework, and 3D graphics.

I am involved with PreTeXt as an author (I've written a book for our Math 3410 linear algebra course), an editor (for the APEX Calculus textbooks), and developer. I maintain an open textbook server that supports many of our undergraduate courses with free, open textbooks, many of which are written in PreTeXt.

WeBWorK

Our WeBWorK online homework server can be found at webwork.cs.uleth.ca. This server provides online interactive homework for many of our first and second year courses in Mathematics and Statistics. We also provide service to the Department of Physics, and selected courses in Liberal Arts and Engineering.