Francis Su

Mathematician, teacher, author, and former president of the Mathematical Association of America.

Francis Su is the Benediktsson-Karwa Professor of Mathematics at Harvey Mudd College, and a former president of the Mathematical Association of America. He received his B.S. in Mathematics from the University of Texas at Austin and his Ph.D. from Harvard University. His research is in topological combinatorics and applications to the social sciences, including game theory, voting theory, triangulations of polytopes, and the mathematics of fair decisions. He has co-authored numerous papers with undergraduates.

Su also has a passion for teaching and popularizing mathematics through writing and public engagement. His work has been profiled in Quanta Magazine, Wired, and the New York Times. Three of his articles have been featured in Princeton Press’ Best Writing on Mathematics in 2011, 2014, and 2018. 

Su is a Fellow of the American Mathematical Society. He served as president of the Mathematical Association of America from 2015 to 2017 and as vice-president of the American Mathematical Society from 2020 to 2023. His honors include the Haimo Award for distinguished teaching, the Halmos–Ford Award and Hasse Prize for mathematical exposition, and the Euler Book Prize. His book Mathematics for Human Flourishing (2020), published by Yale University Press, won the 2021 Euler Book Prize, and has been translated into 9 languages. It offers an inclusive vision of what math is, whom it’s for, and why anyone should learn it.