Dr Parag Mehta (P.D.)
I am Dr Parag Mehta, Lecturer in the Department of Data Analytics and Digitalisation at the School of Business and Economics, Maastricht University.
I was trained as a pure mathematician:
PhD, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces
MSc, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay
BSc, St Xavier's College, Bombay
Before joining Maastricht University, I spent fourteen years in leadership roles within the United World Colleges movement. I headed the mathematics department at UWC Mahindra College (India) and UWC Maastricht (Netherlands), and taught at UWC Dilijan (Armenia). Across those years my wife Kermeen and I served as house parents in fully residential settings, working in loco parentis with students from over a hundred countries. That experience, more than anything else, shapes how I think about teaching: mathematics taught alongside music and literature, classrooms built around curiosity rather than coverage, and the conviction that good teaching is inseparable from pastoral attention.
As Programme Leader of the MSc Digital Business and Economics, I design curricula that bridge mathematics, data science, ethics, and emerging technologies. My teaching rests on Socratic inquiry, ethical dissonance, and problem-based learning, and is oriented toward helping students become independent, critical thinkers.
Expertises
I am a pure mathematician by training. My research sits in harmonic analysis on symmetric spaces, with a current focus on the pole geometry of the Harish-Chandra c-function for root systems of type BC_r. Parallel interests include derived categories of coherent sheaves and their semiorthogonal decompositions, phantom phenomena in smooth proper dg-categories, and the bridge between commutative and noncommutative motives, alongside ongoing engagement with geometric invariant theory and with derived algebraic geometry as a working language. Alongside the mathematics, I have a sustained interest in the pedagogical, ethical, and epistemic dimensions of generative AI in higher education and in business practice, and I am beginning to explore applications of topological data analysis in digital business contexts.
Career history
2023 – Present: Program Leader, Digital Business & Economics MSc, Department of Data Analytics & Digitalisation, School of Business and Economics, Maastricht University
Apr 2023 – Mar 2024: Education Coordinator, Department of Data Analytics & Digitalisation, SBE, Maastricht University
2021 – Present: Docent 2, Department of Data Analytics & Digitalisation, SBE, Maastricht University
2020 – 2021: Mathematics Teacher, Akademeia High School, Warsaw, Poland
2019 – 2020: Mathematics Teacher, UWC Dilijan, Armenia
2016 – 2019: Head of Mathematics Department (IB MYP & DP), UWC Maastricht, Netherlands
2006 – 2016: Head of Mathematics Department, UWC Mahindra College, Pune, India
2003 – 2006: Assistant Professor of Mathematics, Westfield State University, Massachusetts, USA
1996 – 2003: Graduate Assistant in Mathematics, New Mexico State University, USA