Search
Media Release – June 16, 2020
Canadian Mathematical Society

Dr. Claude Levesque to Receive the 2020 Graham Wright Award for Distinguished Service

Ottawa (ON) ─ The Canadian Mathematical Society (CMS) is pleased to announce that Dr. Claude Levesque has been named the recipient of the 2020 Graham Wright Award for Distinguished Service.

Claude Levesque has made sustained and distinguished contributions to the Canadian mathematical community and, in particular, to the Canadian Mathematical Society (CMS) in numerous ways.  He organized three influential CMS conferences at his home university, Laval. As an organizer, he had a strategy of developing conferences with many special sessions. While the diversity of sessions at these meetings served the broader mathematical community, the meetings also broke attendance records.

Claude Levesque was devoted to fostering and developing publications to serve the Canadian mathematical community. He served for many years as Editor and Editor in Chief of Annales des sciences mathématiques du Québec, a joint publication with the Institut des sciences mathématiques du Québec (ISM) and the Centre de recherche mathématique (CRM). When conditions changed, and the journal needed a new home, he helped transition this journal to a new Springer journal, Annales mathématiques du Québec (AMQ), where it enjoyed great success, with papers from top mathematicians.

He helped build community at many levels in Canada by sharing his love of mathematics with others.  Claude Levesque helped found the Centre interuniversitaire en calcul mathématique algébrique (CICMA), established in 1990, which provides a critical mass in number theory and computational algebra, with researchers at Concordia, Laval and McGill. The main goals of CICMA is to support of research in these areas, and to promote research interactions between the subjects. With colleagues, Claude Levesque was also foundational in establishing the Canadian Number Theory Association (CNTA). This association contributes to the excellent health of the Canadian mathematical community by organizing meetings across the country. In a similar vein, Claude Levesque, with colleague Chip Snyder, created the annual Quebec-Maine Number Theory Conference.  Again, this has had an enduring positive impact on the mathematics in Canada.

Claude Levesque’s contributions have extended beyond Canada’s borders. He has been very generous with his time lecturing in developing countries, and he has lectured very widely (in almost 45 countries).

President of the Canadian Mathematical Society, Mark Lewis, acknowledges Dr. Levesque’s service to the community : “Claude Levesque has served the Canadian mathematical community over an entire career in many different ways: leading publication ventures, organizing meetings and developing new centres and associations.  The impact of his work is impressive and wide ranging and we are very pleased to be able to present him with the Graham Wright Award for Distinguished Service.”

Claude Levesque finished his undergraduate studies at Université Laval in 1970 where he then continued his studies and received his Master’s degree in mathematics in 1973. In the following years, Dr. Levesque completed his Ph.D. at the Illinois Institute of Technology. He has been teaching at Laval University since 1986, but has served as invited professors in many different universities such as University of Hawaii, Concordia University and University of Saga.

About the Graham Wright Award for Distinguished Service

The Graham Wright Award for Distinguished Service is presented annually to an individual who has made sustained and significant contributions to the Canadian mathematics community, particularly through their involvement with the CMS. This award is named in honour of Dr. Graham Wright (Ottawa) who served as the CMS Executive Director and Secretary from 1979 to 2009.

For information about past recipients visit: Graham Wright Award for Distinguished Service

About the Canadian Mathematical Society (CMS)

Founded in 1945, the CMS is the main national organization whose goal is to promote and advance the discovery, learning and application of mathematics. The Society’s activities cover the whole spectrum of mathematics including scientific meetings, publications, grants, math camps and national and international mathematics competitions, as well as awards and prizes that recognize outstanding achievements.

For more information, please contact:

Prof. Mark Lewis (Alberta)
President & Chair
CMS Distinguished Awards Selection Committee
Tel: 780-492-0197
chair-dasc@cms.math.ca
or Dr. Termeh Kousha
Executive Director
Canadian Mathematical Society
Tel: 613-733-2262 ext. 713
director@cms.math.ca