Description: Expanding Horizons recently had the opportunity to interview Wenjun Zhu, the winner of the Society of Actuaries’ (SOA’s) third Actuarial Science Early Career Award.

Description: Increasing technology is available to create and disseminate educational resources worldwide. In response, this article advocates creation of open educational resources (OERs) that will benefit the actuarial profession with both recruitment and retention of members. Specifically, we describe OER contributions made at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and more recently through the ASTIN Academy, a working group of ASTIN, the non-life section of the International Actuarial Association. We advocate pushing boundaries and creating new ways of teaching effectively for the future. The innovative use of technology and open-source materials is a way to foster diversity, equity, and inclusion in the actuarial profession.

Description: 2021 SOA Health Meeting Recap

Description: Interview with John Robinson, SOA President-Elect and Vice Chair, on several topics of importance to the SOA.

Description: The incoming E&R chair for the coming year reflects on past accomplishments of the E&R council, acknowledges with thanks contributors, and looks forward to continuation in the coming year.

Description: This is a notice is a call of papers reflecting actuarial and insurance related themes.

Description: A call for essays from the Society of Actuaries Research Institute's Mortality and Longevity Strategic Research Program, focusing on the potential impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) on human longevity and its consequences for modeling future survival/mortality. Details submission rules, sample topics, and awards for essays exploring this subject.

Description: This is a request for surrender experience data for fixed-rate deferred annuities for the years 2023-2024 from the SOA Research Institute and LIMRA, outlining goals for updating a prior study and offering detailed outputs through a paid subscription to Experience Studies Pro.

Description: The author shares their experiences and timeline in building an actuarial science program from scratch and reaching the Advanced Curriculum level

Description: This presentation proposes a solution to the student actuarial paradox “I mastered the syllabus but failed the exam,” by utilizing the two-dimensional syllabus vehicle which pedagogically focuses on the two dimensions of content and problem difficulty. This presentation advocates the PMR characterization of three levels of problems difficulty: Plug-ins (easy), Monkey-wrench (intermediate), and Research-type(hard) questions. PMR was developed by examining difficulty levels in SOA exams, and problems of various software vendors. The author's students routinely score high on the SOA FM exam; it is hoped that these methods will assist other instructors in their quest for good pedagogy. Very briefly: “Plug-ins,” refer to multi-part problems, for example, calculating the price of an annuity that is first increasing and then level; “Monkey-wrench” problems specifically refer to plug-in multi-part problems where one component is a monkey-wrench, an issue the candidate has not previously encountered. It might be a non-typical modeling or it might be a non-typical algebraic simplification or it might be an unexpected integration of distinct modules in a manner that the candidate has not yet seen. “Research-type questions” refer to problems requiring some type of experimentation for example, looking at initial cases, seeing a pattern and then applying methods