Richard Alfred Tapia (March 25, 1938 – May 22, 2026) was an American mathematician and academic who was a professor at Rice University in Houston, Texas. He held the title of University Professor, the university's highest academic rank. In 1996, President Bill Clinton awarded Tapia the Presidential Award for Mathematics, Science, and Engineering Mentoring. In 2011, President Barack Obama awarded Tapia the National Medal of Science. He was the Maxfield and Oshman professor of engineering; associate director of graduate studies, Office of Research and Graduate Studies; and director of the Center for Excellence and Equity in Education at Rice University. Tapia's mathematical research was centered on mathematical optimization and iterative methods for nonlinear problems, with his most recent work focused on algorithms for constrained optimization and interior point methods for linear and nonlinear programming.
Early life and education Richard Alfred Tapia was born on March 25, 1938, in Santa Monica, California, to parents Amado and Magda Tapia, who both immigrated to the United States from Mexico. He and his twin brother were the oldest of five siblings, with two younger brothers and sister. His father worked for Japanese-American horticulturists in southern California. Tapia received his BA in mathematics from the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1961. He then earned his M.A. in mathematics, also from the University of California, Los Angeles, in 1966. In 1968, he received his PhD from University of California, Los Angeles, in mathematics with the dissertation: "A Generalization of Newton's Method with an Application to the Euler–Lagrange Equation" under advisors Magnus Hestenes and Charles Tompkins.
Career
Tapia was the University Professor at Rice University from 2005 until his death in 2026. His professional academic career began in 1968 when he accepted an assistant professor position at the Mathematics Research Center (MRC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. After two years at the MRC, he moved to Rice University, where he remained.
University positions 1968–1970: Assistant Professor, Army Mathematics Research Center, University of Wisconsin–Madison 1970–1972: Assistant Professor of Mathematical Sciences, Rice University 1972–1976: Associate Professor of Mathematical Sciences, Rice University 1976–?: Professor of Mathematical Sciences, Rice University 1978–1983: Chair, Department of Mathematical Sciences, Rice University 1978–1983: Adjunct Professor, T.I.R.R., (then called the Texas Institute for Rehabilitation and Research) Baylor College of Medicine 1986–1988: Lecturer, Department of Community Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine 1989–2000: Director of Education and Outreach Programs, Center for Research on Parallel Computation, Rice University 1989–?: Associate Director of Graduate Studies, Office of Research and Graduate Studies, Rice University 1991–2005: Noah Harding Professor of Computational and Applied Mathematics, Rice University 1999–?: Director, Center for Excellence and Equity in Education, Rice University 2000–?: Adjunct Professor, College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, University of Houston 2005–2026: Maxfield and Oshman Professor of Engineering, Rice University 2005–2026: University Professor, Rice University
External positions 1978–1991: Editor, SIAM Journal on Numerical Analysis 1981–1996: Editor, Journal of Optimization Theory and Applications 1989–1992: Member, SIAM Board of Trustees 1990–1991: Editor, SIAM Journal on Optimization 1992–1994: Member, Mathematical Sciences Education Board, National Research Council 1992: Member, National Academy of Engineering 1996–2002: Member, National Science Board 2001-2004: Chair, Board on Higher Education and the Workforce, National Research Council
Publications Tapia published two books and authored or co-authored over 100 research papers in mathematics. In 2022, Tapia published the book Losing the Precious Few: How America Fails to Educate its Minorities in Science and Engineering. The book examines the lack of representation of domestic minority groups in STEM fields, identifying key causes such as standardized testing, gaps in K-12 education, and racial biases. He emphasizes the importance of improving access to higher education to address this disparity. The book offers insights for educators, students, and parents on fostering a more inclusive academic environment.
Books Tapia, Richard A.; Thompson, J.R. (1978). Nonparametric Density Estimation. Baltimore, Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press. Tapia, Richard A.; Thompson, J.R. (1990). Nonparametric Function Estimation, Modeling, and Simulation. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM).
Personal life and death Tapia married Jean Rodriguez Tapia. They were married 63 years at the time of her death in November 2022. They had had three children. Their daughter, Circee, was killed by a drunk driver in 1982. Tapia died in Houston, Texas, on May 22, 2026, at the age of 88, from liver cancer.
Awards and honors
In 1992, Tapia became the first Hispanic elected to the National Academy of Engineering. In 1996, President Bill Clinton awarded Tapia the Presidential Award for Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring. That same year, Clinton appointed Tapia to the National Science Board, where he served until 2002. In 2001, the first ACM Richard Tapia Celebration of Diversity in Computing Conference was held in Houston, Texas with 164 attendees. The annual conference has grown to include thousands of attendees.
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