HELLO, my name is Kathy Cramer.
Hometown? I was born in Bethpage (Long Island), New York. Bethpage is most noted for Bethpage State Park and its five world-class public golf courses. The U.S. Open Championship was held on the Black Course in 2002 and 2009. Tiger Woods won it in 2002.
What was your very first job? My first job was working in the Estée Lauder factory on Long Island. I worked there for two summers while in college. While factory work was mind numbing, I remember enjoying meeting and working with other college students hired for the summer. It also paid greater than the minimum wage.
When did you join UMRA? In 2018.
What was your occupation when you retired from FT work? I retired from the University of Minnesota as associate professor of mathematics education in the College of Education and Human Development. Before coming to the University, I was a professor of mathematics education at the University of Wisconsin–River Falls.
What inspired your interest in mathematics and education? I was an undergraduate mathematics major at Syracuse University. Mathematics was a subject I always enjoyed. While I didn’t take course work in teaching as an undergraduate, I did volunteer at a local school in Syracuse for young mothers, tutoring high school girls in math. At that time, when a girl was pregnant, she wasn’t allowed to continue going to her regular school but had to attend school at a special program within the district. I found out that I enjoyed teaching mathematics, and upon graduation I built on that tutoring experience to become part of a new Title I math laboratory project in the elementary schools in the Syracuse district.
From your perspective as a teacher of teachers for 20-plus years, how has the teaching—and learning—of mathematics changed since most UMRA members attended elementary school? The teaching and learning of mathematics has evolved a great deal over the 20 or more years I was in academia. In the early ’70s, the focus started to change from teaching procedures to teaching for understanding. Research on children’s thinking that documents what meaningful learning looks like, impacted how we teach. My area of research focused on teaching fractions. We know that children learn fractions best using a variety of concrete models that help them construct, for themselves, an understanding of fractions as numbers that are distinct from whole numbers. Models help students build meaning for the relative size of fractions and how to add, subtract, multiply and divide them.
Do you have any tips for would-be grandparent-tutors? Don’t teach your grandchildren the procedures you learned. Ask children how they solve math tasks. Encourage children to estimate reasonable answers. Ask children to draw pictures or use objects to explain their thinking.
You have been a leader of the UMRA Book Club for several years. What prompted you to join the group? I love reading and always wanted to be part of a book club. I have so enjoyed being part of this group, as I have had the opportunity to read authors I might not have selected on my own. One book in particular that we read a few years ago has stayed with me: Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell.
What is a fun fact about you we might not know? I met my husband in Minnesota, but he also is a displaced Long Islander. He grew up 10 miles from Bethpage.
News
The 2026 Nominating Committee is looking for your suggestions for candidates for UMRA board and officer positions. If you know of someone who might be willing to step up to an UMRA leadership role—and that someone could be you!—please contact Julie Sweitzer, Nominating Committee chair.
How would you like to participate in one or more informal afternoon group conversations at the Campus Club with University leaders—deans, center directors, department heads, for example—regarding their current situations and thoughts about the future?
The University Retirees Volunteer Center greets 2026 with some exciting news: its office is moving to Morrill Hall, which houses the University’s administrative offices on the Twin Cities campus. The space is being provided by the office of Chris Gade, the vice president for communications, who oversees University Marketing Communications.
Meet UMRA member Pat Tollefson, founder of the UMRA Book Club (in 2011) and shining example of how volunteering and engaging in a variety of other activities can lead to a full life in retirement.
Here’s how to make payments for UMRA events easily in the UMRA member portal, and how to use your UMRA membership card for on-campus parking and other discounts, including University Bookstores.
Marilyn Erickson has an interesting set of three family history stories that she wrote “to check out the verbal family stories and connect them to documentation and photos.”
Drawing on his training as a historian, his patience and more than a little serendipity, Jim Tracy put together an account of his family history. “This account is for our family, if not now, perhaps later, I hope it may also be of interest for others looking into the history of their families.”
Then there are the unexpected things that happen…
… like a box of family history from a cousin that was completely unexpected. Perhaps it is like an unexpected DNA match.