photo provided by Jessica Newton Photography

Alumni who met in IUK math class get engaged on campus

A discrete math class + an Instagram DM + a chance encounter in the Cougar Country Café = a surprise engagement on campus for two Indiana University Kokomo alumni.

Kyler Spencer, B.S. ’20, proposed to Tifany Burnett, B.S.’22, an adjunct faculty member in mathematics, on the patio outside the Math Commons at the end of the fall 2025 semester. While that may not seem like an obvious location for such a romantic event, it added up for this particular couple.

Spencer said Burnett’s mother suggested it, since it’s right outside the classroom where they met in 2019.

“I actually proposed just on the other side of the classroom we met in,” he said. “I knew she would be surprised. She never would have expected me to show up at her workplace, and it was a special location. Her surprise and capturing that surprise were the most important things.”

He enlisted a crew of friends and family to help him pull off the surprise. Burnett’s sister Katie invited her to have manicures, knowing she would want her hands to look nice in pictures showing off the ring she helped him pick. Math faculty members Amelia Tebbe and Deb Jaworski helped with planning details and plotted how to have her in place at the right moment. Tebbe made sure Spencer was out of sight until the last minute, and videoed the proposal, while math faculty member Christopher Caruvana and Diane Hampshire attended to congratulate them.

Jaworski asked Burnett to help her get something from her car, and she suspected nothing.

“I stepped outside and there were cameras pointed at me,” Burnett said. “You can see me in the video walking out the door, and then he came around the corner and got down on one knee. It all happened so fast.”

He definitely pulled off the surprise, she said.

“I had an inkling it was going to happen soon, but I had no idea where or when, which is what I wanted,” she said. “I cried a little bit. It felt like a dream.”

She was also impressed that, with so many people who knew what was about to happen, she never even heard a whisper of gossip.

“They did a very good job,” she said.

Their engagement is the latest chapter in a story that began in discrete math class in 2019. Spencer, from Rochester, reached out to Burnett through Instagram, and mentioned they were in the same class. Soon after, they ran into each other in the café and began dating from there.

Tebbe, who taught their math class, recalled a day the two arrived to class a few minutes late, with “cute, goofy smiles” during class.

“I remember thinking, ‘It’s none of my business, but I wonder if there’s something going on there,’” she said. “I found out much later that they’d gone on one of their first dates that day for lunch. Tifany and Kyler are such kind, smart, and fun people, so I’m confident in their happy future. I was delighted to get to witness this milestone in their lives together.”

Spencer completed his computer science degree in 2020, while Burnett, from Logansport, graduated with degrees in mathematics and biochemistry in 2022. She completed a master’s degree in applied mathematics at Purdue in 2025 and became an adjunct faculty member during the fall semester.

Spencer, who works as an applications developer for Purdue Federal Credit Union, supported her through the challenge of graduate school.

“There were times I wanted to drop out and just be done, and he would tell me I said I was going to do it, and I would,” she said. “He was definitely my biggest supporter through grad school.”

They are looking at wedding dates this fall somewhere in the Kokomo area — though not on campus.

Burnett said she could not think of a more perfect place for this chapter in their story.

“We met here, now I work here, and we’re both alumni,” she said. “We’re the math dork and the computer dork, and we got engaged on campus.”

Education is KEY at Indiana University Kokomo.