‘You Pay It Forward’

By Beth McMurtrie

John Everett for The Chronicle

Richard Tapia, an engineering professor at Rice, advises Naomi Reed, a former student seeking career ideas. Mr. Tapia seeks to engage more women and minorities in the sciences.

Richard A. Tapia claims he is “basically shy.” That may come as a surprise to the hundreds of students and faculty members he has befriended over the years at Rice University and around the country. The mathematician has invited strangers for dinner, attended students’ weddings, and included his wife in so many activities that she’s known as Mom Jean.

It’s part of his strategy to provide a nurturing environment in which all students can thrive in the rigorous worlds of math and science. “That’s the way my father was, that’s the way my mother was,” says Mr. Tapia, whose parents emigrated from Mexico as teenagers. “My father always told me ‘Richard, you don’t pay it back, you pay it forward.’ "

Mr. Tapia, an engineering professor, is seen as a warm and welcoming presence on the campus, but his advice is no nonsense. He doesn’t shy away from telling graduate students or young faculty members when they’re coming up short. His message: Be professional, always.

“I know how to be a friend with them and also be an adviser,” he says. “That I don’t have a problem with. A lot of people do.”

He dates the emphasis on meticulous career planning back to his time as a young assistant professor the 1970s. While universities were hiring more minority faculty members than in the past, some of them were struggling. “I saw in order to survive I needed to establish myself as a professional,” he recalls. That meant getting tenure before devoting himself to the kind of expansive mentoring he has done since, which is what he encourages young faculty members to do as well.

Mr. Tapia’s mentoring skills were even noted by President Obama when he bestowed a National Medal of Science on the mathematician in 2011.

Those Mr. Tapia has mentored testify to his professionalism and his positive attitude. “He makes you believe in yourself,” says Juan C. Meza, dean of the School of Natural Sciences at the University of California at Merced.

Cristina Villalobos, a math professor at the University of Texas-Pan American, recalls reading about Mr. Tapia when she was an undergraduate at the University of Texas at Austin. Like him, she was a first-generation Mexican-American college student. She and a friend contacted him, and that weekend found themselves at a restaurant having dinner with him and other faculty members from Rice.

“He had a lot of influence on campus,” recalls Ms. Villalobos, who ended up pursuing her doctorate at Rice. “And he always had an open-door policy.” She continues to seek Mr. Tapia’s advice, particularly when she feels frustrated that she’s not reaching her goals fast enough. Like her mentor, she is engaged in on-campus efforts to increase the number of women and minorities in STEM fields. He reminds her to take the long view and not give up.

Asked how he balances the demands on his time, Mr. Tapia says it’s a constant struggle. “Yesterday I was in D.C. doing outreach activities on minorities in STEM, but I was back this morning doing my research,” he says. “If I don’t keep up my reputation as a good scientist, I’m not doing my students any favors.”