Contact Information

Email: kheller@noctrl.edu

Phone: (630) 637-5226

Office: Goldspohn 26

Office Hours: I will be out of this office this summer, but am available via email. 

About Me

I am currently an Assistant Professor of Mathematics at North Central College in Naperville, IL. I grew up in South Carolina and, after attending the University of South Carolina for undergrad, I received my Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Virginia in August 2010. I am passionate about teaching and, while attending UVa, was honored to be featured in an article for A&S Online Magazine, which you can read here. In addition, while in grad school, I won an all-university graduate teaching assistant award in 2009. I am a 2010-2011 Project NExT fellow.

I have also been involved in several Girls and Math Summer Programs at the University of Virginia (2006, 2007, 2008) and Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, MA (2009). Girls and Math is a week-long mathematics camp for girls in grades 5th through 8th. The program allows talented and enthusiastic middle school girls from the local area to explore several aspects of mathematics not covered by the traditional school curriculum. In addition, I was excited to organize the first-ever Sonia Kovalevsky Day at North Central College this past spring alongside math professor Mary McMahon with funding by a grant from the Association for Women in Mathematics and the National Science Foundation. 

Research

My primary research interest is function-theoretic operator theory. Specifically, I study composition operators on spaces of analytic functions. Students interested in learning about my research or doing their own undergraduate research should stop by my office!

Outside Interests

Outside of math, I love watching sports, especially my back-to-back national champion South Carolina baseball team and (less successful, but still fun to watch) gamecock football team. Even though I now live in Big-10 country, there's nothing like SEC football! I also love to travel, cook, read, watch movies, and play board/card-games. My favorite author is Rick Bragg and I believe everyone should read All Over But the Shoutin'.