Dr. Nikita Patterson's Love of Teaching Extends to Service Excellence

CLARKSTON, Ga.—Teaching math has always been a part of Dr. Nikita Patterson’s life—but she traveled a different road at first before coming back to her first love—teaching future teachers.

The 2024 recipient of the Service Excellence Award started her career as a chemical engineer with NASA, before deciding to return to education.

Her inspiration for a career in mathematics started with her mom, she said, who also majored in math in college. It then blossomed under one of the most influential Black women in STEM.

“I always loved teaching. My mother was a math major in college and when I was younger I used to play school with my little sister and cousin and pretend to be a teacher,” said Patterson.

While an undergrad at Spelman College, her scholarship advisor, Dr. Etta Falconer, encouraged Patterson to pursue a STEM field. Falconer was one of the first African American women in the nation to obtain a PhD in mathematics (in 1969 from Emory University), and a role model not only to Patterson but to hundreds of Spelman women who went on to pursue STEM careers.

“She was amazing,” said Patterson said of Falconer. “I asked her how do I become a math professor—and she told me I would have to get a PhD.”

Patterson first pursued the sciences through Spelman College’s dual degree engineering program, graduating with both her undergrad degree in chemistry from Spelman and a chemical engineering degree from Georgia Tech.

As a NASA scholar in college, she worked for the agency as an intern during the summers, and then as a full-time engineer after graduation.

But her heart wasn’t in it. “I realized what I really loved about chemistry and engineering was the mathematics,” Patterson said. She left NASA for grad school to pursue math and math education, and following Falconer’s advice—received her doctorate in mathematics education from North Carolina State University.

After teaching graduate students both at Kennesaw State University and Georgia State’s Atlanta Campus, Patterson came to Perimeter in 2017, focusing on preparing education majors to become mathematics teachers. (She teaches math courses both for education pathway and students pursuing STEM fields). She loved the community and collegiately of Perimeter College, and the students who made up her classes, she said.

Her philosophy of teaching is simple but direct.

“I believe all students can learn math, and research shows effective teachers have high expectations for their students,” she said. “I believe I have high expectations for my Perimeter students, and I hope I model this for these prospective teachers, so it transfers to them and their classrooms.”

While she models excellence in teaching, it was Patterson’s record of service to both her profession and to the university that garnered her the college’s service excellence award.

From curriculum committees to search committees, Patterson has stepped up to the plate to serve.  Soon after arriving at Perimeter College, she joined the committee for the college mathematics conference and has since served as both co-chair and chair of the conference, helping pivot the program to a virtual format during the pandemic from 2020-22. At the same time, she was already serving in leadership roles in both the American Mathematical Association of Two-Year Colleges (AMAYTC) and was the state president of the Georgia Mathematical Association of Two-Year Colleges (GMATYC).

She is currently serving as the local events coordinator for the 50^th anniversary of the AMATYC national conference, which will be in Atlanta in November 2024.

Outside of the mathematical world, Patterson was named an inaugural board member of Georgia State’s Faculty of the African Diaspora Association (FADA) where she also has served as secretary.

She was elected in 2020 and serves as a member of the University Faculty Senate. This semester she also is teaching courses on the Atlanta campus, where she is a mathematics faculty lead for Georgia State’s Panther Gateway program. She was also named to the 2023-24 class of GSU’s Leadership Academy for Women Faculty.