- 1932 February 5 — Born Irwin Jacob Hoffman in Independence, IA, to Morris Hoffman (1907–1990) and Margaret (née Goldfarb) (1906 –1987); Orthodox Jewish family; father taught chemistry at a junior college.
- 1935 or 6 — moved to Denver because his maternal grandmother died; they lived across the street from East High School. Morris offered to substitute teach in chemistry, physics, or math. The next day the teacher died, and he was hired. Family joined Beth HaMedrosh Hagodol conservative congregation, because there was no orthodox synagogue in Denver.
- 1945 — began playing tennis
- 1947 May 25 — graduated BMH synagogue
- 1949 June 14 — graduated East High School; tennis champion
- 1952–53 — Chemistry teacher at Regis Jesuit HS, Denver
- 1953 — B.S. degree from University of Denver College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, major: mathematics; attended on tennis scholarship; member Phi Beta Kappa, Pi Delta Theta, Delta Chi, Pi Mu Epsilon, Omicron Delta Kappa, Phi Delta Kappa, Air Force ROTC
- Hired by IBM, starting date postponed while he went to Korea. But instead of working for IBM after the war, he enrolled in college
- 1953 — Joined Air Force as 2nd lieutenant
- 1953–1954 — Studied meteorology at UCLA, then went to Hawaii to study tropical meteorology
- —Promoted to first lieutenant
—played on Far East AF tennis team at the Japanese Imperial Palace in Tokyo & in Baguio in the Philippines. They tried to hire him to teach math at the Philippine military academy & AF gave permission
—Stationed in the Eniwetok Atoll in the Marshall Islands, and Kyushu, Japan
- 1957 — discharged from AF and returned to Denver; joined AF Reserve, promoted to captain
- 1955–1957 — The University of Maryland ran courses for people in the military on military bases and took qualified people to teach. Irwin taught college-level calculus in Kyushu, Japan & Greenville, MS
- 1957 — Admitted to doctoral study at DU School of Education on the GI Bill
- 1957 — retired from competitive tennis (severe tennis elbow); became tennis pro at Green Gables Country Club; had 17 students in group lessons, loved it, same creative things, had them count to 3 in 5 languages; gave each language a hierarchy and the farther along they were with the skill, that was the language they used; the louder they were, the more attention Irwin gave them. Low to high, and point to the sky (and count to 3); had to beat Harvey the Rabbit when they served
- many things going on in business; a guy from Dartmouth inventing BASIC; guy from Harvard invented LOGO; IBM had Fortran 2
- at end of Korean War, big revolution in education; hired guys from Stanford to rewrite the curriculum. SMSG
- 1958 August 1 — married Eileen Beverlee Goroshow
- 1958 — started teaching as a direct result of Sputnik — there was a great need for math teachers. Courses at DU started at 4 pm, so Irwin was free during the day started teaching lower level math at North HS; principal changed his grades because he thought Irwin was giving too many low grades (only Cs & Ds: an A student had to know as much about the subject as Irwin did); they gave him a junior high next door to a juvenile detention center & his students were all JVs. They used to do crimes so they could get into Juve Hall and watch TV. He had the students make an abacus out of various food products & then gave them permission to eat it.
- Dreamed up clever ways to teach because he was bored or because the kids were bored or because he wanted a new experience
- then taught at South HS
- 1958 March 14 — MA degree from Univ of Denver College of Arts & Humanities, major: liberal arts; only taught after 4 pm
- 1960 June 17 — received Colorado Dept of Education Temporary Teacher Certificate
- 1960 — mathematics teacher at newly opened George Washington High School
- 1960, 1962 — children born
- 1962 — summer Robert Albrecht of Control Data gave computer course to GWHS students
- 1963 — went to Wesleyan University on NSF scholarship, to prepare to refresh calculus skills
- 1964 — began teaching AP calculus
- 1964 — sent GWHS students to Opportunity School for computer, using punch-cards
- 1965 — DPS decides not to send students to CU, Denver, computer course
- 196? — began teaching mathematics with programmable calculators
- 1966 Sep — began teaching computer mathematics with computers
- 196? — established first high school computer lab in the country; grandfather of computer-based instruction in the schools
- 1963–64 — school year sabbatical from GWHS
- 1969–70 — school year sabbatical from GWHS
- 1971 — PhD from University of Denver College of Education; thesis: “Computer Applications in Second Year Algebra”
- 197? — divorced
- 1973 — married Jacqueline “Jacquie”
- 1979 April 17 — appeared on Channel 6, “representing Secondary Education”
- 1980 December 18–20 — invitational conference on computer literacy under the sponsorship of the National Science Foundation. Robert J. Seidel, Ph.D., conference coordinator: “I would like personally to express appreciation for the significant contribution made to the conference by Irwin Hoffman.”
- 1980, 1981 — Special speaker on Computer Applications to Curriculum at national convention of National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) in Miami and Atlanta
- 1981 November 10 — Rocky Mountain Jewish Historical Society, Ira M. Beck Memorial Archives, Center for Judaic Studies University of Denver
- 1981, 1983 — Keynote speaker, DPS convention on Exploring the uses of Microcomputers in the Schools
- Speaker at four of the annual conventions of the Colorado Teachers of Mathematics—topics: Advanced Placement Program, Computer Programming in Secondary Schools, Microcomputers in Secondary Schools, and Bilingual Program
- 1982, 1983 — Presenter, Colorado Bilingual Education Conference, on process and products of Title VII demonstration grant
- 1983 — Speaker, DU chapter convention of Phi Delta Kappa, Denver, CO; Regional Conference of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, Colorado Springs, CO; Panelist on “Pre-College Education in Mathematics,” National Convention of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM), June, 1983, Denver, CO; Speaker, Colorado Association of School Executives (CASE), Colorado Springs; Speaker, Western Regional Convention of National Association of School Board Executives (NASBE), Santa Fe, NM; Keynote speaker, State of Louisiana Principals Institute in Many, LA; Keynote speaker, Southern Regional Association of Educators in Data Processing (AEDP) in Jackson, MS; Special speaker, National Association of Computer Machinery Special Interest Group in Computer Science (ACMSIGCSE), Orlando, FL; Speaker, National Convention World Futures Society, Dallas, TX.
- 1984 — Speaker, IBM Science Advisory Committee, Boulder, CO; Florida State Department of Education, Instructional Computer Conference, Orlando, FL, February 1994 [1984?]; Speaker, Oklahoma Public Schools Conference on uses of Computers in the Schools. “Shared Resources Computer Laboratory.” Given for administrators and school board members; Speaker, Texas State Instructional Computing Conference, Austin; Speaker, National Council for Teachers of Mathematics and the University of MD, “Impact of Computers on School Mathematics Curriculum.”
- Invited paper, Reston, VA
- 1984 — consultant to Nebraska State Department of Education on Bilingual Software
- Appointed contributing editor to Electronic Education
- 1986 January 20 — Speaker, New York City chapter of Association for Computing Machinery on “Computers in Secondary School Education.”
- 1986 December — Retired from GWHS
- 1990-1996+ — consultant for IBM, showing how to use the computer to teach math, traveled the world, Guam, Hawaii, Bangkok — 1–2 day residencies, mostly at conventions, teaching HS and college teachers; lecturing at Princeton for 3 days; kept working at GGCC in the summers
- By 1987 — member, advisory board to the National Science Foundation, Council for the Consortium of Mathematics and its Applications (COMAP)
- 2007 — retired from teaching tennis
- 2012 — videotaped oral history about his work in education, mathematics, and tennis
- 2017 — inducted into the Jewish Community Center Denver Sports Hall of Fame, as “the most triumphant Jewish tennis teacher professional. Ever.”
- 2020 October 14 — died in Denver, Colorado.
Maverick Mathematical Maven
