[Editor's note: Robin officially retired from Bates in 2002.]

I did my undergraduate work at Columbia (except for sophomore year at Williams). I received my B.A. in economics in 1957 and did graduate work in economics at Yale University, specializing in money-and-banking, international trade, and econometrics. While at Yale my interests shifted to logic, computer science, and mathematics. I left Yale in 1961 with an MA in economics, worked for a year as a research assistant at the Center for Advanced Studies in Behavioral Sciences at Stanford, went to Santa Monica in 1962 where I worked at System Development Corporation (a non-profit corporation specializing in the development of huge computerized command and control systems for the military) for fifteen months. I then worked at the RAND Corporation (a think tank) for four years operations research, working in the areas of computer simulation, inventory and queuing theory, and linear and non-linear programming. While at RAND I earned my Ph.D. at UCLA in mathematics, specializing in algebraic topology and writing my dissertation on Coincidences, Roots, and Fixed Points. (I was Bob Brown's first Ph.D. student; Bob Brown was Ed Fadell's first student. Peter Wong was also, somewhat later a student of Ed Fadell. That makes Peter my intellectual uncle!).

After receiving my Ph.D. in 1967, I taught mathematics and statistics at Bowdoin for five years before coming to Bates in 1972. At Bates I have taught at one time or another most of the mathematics and computer science courses. I also filled in for the economics department two years, teaching statistics and econometrics.

While teaching at Bates, I have also done consulting in operations research, statistics, and computers. I have also served as an expert witness in several interesting court cases (mostly involving statistics). My latest computer work has been in data acquisition and control, designing computer hardware and software for applications such as super market refrigeration control and Atlantic salmon fish farm controls.

I have authored and co-authored papers in education, computer science, operation research, physics, game theory, and topology.

I particularly enjoys working with students on a one-to-one basis, directing independent studies in areas such as operations research, mathematical economics (including game theory), computer science, topology, and in fact almost anything -- whether or not I know anything about it.