Madison Math Circle

Weekly Meeting

We have a weekly meeting, Monday at 6pm in 120 Ingraham Hall, during the school year. New students are welcome at any point! There is no required registration, no fee, and the talks are independent of one another, so you can just show up any week. See below for directions.

If you are a student, we hope you will tell other interested students about these talks, and speak with your parents or with your teacher about organizing a car pool to the UW campus. If you are a parent or a teacher, we hope you'll tell your students about these talks and organize a car pool to the UW (all talks take place in Ingraham Hall room 120, on the UW-Madison campus).

What is a Math Circle?

The Madison Math Circle is a weekly series of mathematically based activities aimed at interested middle school and high school students. It is an outreach program organized by the UW Math Department. Our goal is to provide a taste of exciting ideas in math and science. In the past we've had talks about plasma and weather in outer space, video game graphics, and encryption. In the sessions, students (and parents) are often asked to explore problems on their own, with the presenter facilitating a discussion. The talks are independent of one another, so new students are welcome at any point.

The level of the audience varies quite widely, including a mix of middle school and high school students, and the speakers generally address this by considering subjects that will be interesting for a wide range of students.

After each talk we'll have pizza provided by the Mathematics Department, and students will have an opportunity to mingle and chat with the speaker and with other participants, to ask questions about some of the topics that have been discussed, and also about college, careers in science, etc.

The Madison Math circle was featured in Wisconsin State Journal: http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/education/local_schools/school-spotlight-madison-math-circle-gives-young-students-a-taste/article_77f5c042-0b3d-11e1-ba5f-001cc4c03286.html

All right, I want to come!

Directions and parking

Meetings are held in 120 Ingraham Hall.

Parking. Parking on campus is rather limited. Here is as list of some options:

• Directly in front of Ingraham hall, 2 metered spots (25 minute max) in Lot 11 off of Observatory Drive.
• A 0.2 mile walk to Ingraham Hall via these directions, many spots (free starting 4:30pm) in Lot 26 along Observatory Drive.
• A 0.3 mile walk to Ingraham Hall via these directions, many spots (free starting 4:30pm) in Lot 34.
• A 0.2 mile walk to Ingraham Hall via these directions, 2 metered spots (25 minute max) in front of Lathrop Hall.
• A 0.3 mile walk to Ingraham Hall via these directions 6 metered spots (25 minute max) around the loop in front of Chadbourne Hall .
• For more information, see the UW-Madison Parking Info website.

Email list

Sign up for our email list: https://lists.math.wisc.edu/listinfo/math-circle

Contact the organizers

If you have any questions, suggestions for topics, or so on, just email the organizers (Carolyn Abbott, Gheorghe Craciun, Daniel Erman, Lalit Jain, Ryan Julian, and Philip Matchett Wood): math-circle-organizers@math.wisc.edu. We are always interested in feedback!

Report on Math Circle in 2013-14

Annual Report

Donations

Please consider donating to the Madison Math Circle. As noted in our annual report, our main costs consist of pizza and occasional supplies for the speakers. Our costs have been covered so far by donations from the UW Math Department plus generous gifts from a private donor. But our costs are rising, primarily because this year we expect to hold more meetings than in any previous year. In fact, this year, we expect to spend at least $2500 on pizza and supplies alone.

So please consider donating to support your math circle! The easiest way to donate is to go to the link:

Online Donation Link

There are instructions on that page for donating to the Math Department. Be sure and add a Gift Note saying that the donation is intended for the "Madison Math Circle"! The money goes into the Mathematics Department Annual Fund and is routed through the University of Wisconsin Foundation, which is convenient for record-keeping, etc.

Alternately, you can bring a check to one of the Math Circle Meetings. If you write a check, be sure to make it payable to the "WFAA" and add the note "Math Circle Donation" on the check.

Or you can just pay in cash, and we'll give you a receipt.

Flyer

Please feel free to distribute our flyer! Flyer

Help us grow!

If you like Math Circle, please help us continue to grow! Students, parents, and teachers can help by:

• Posting our flyer at schools or anywhere that might have interested students
• Discussing the Math Circle with students, parents, teachers, administrators, and others
• Making an announcement about Math Circle at PTO meetings
• Donating to Math Circle

Contact the organizers if you have questions or your own ideas about how to help out.

Meetings for Fall 2014 and Spring 2015

All talks are at 6pm in Ingraham Hall room 120, unless otherwise noted.

Fall 2014
Date and RSVP links	Speaker	Topic	Link for more info
September 14, 2015	David Sondak	Abstract
September 21, 2015	TBA	Abstract
September 28, 2015	TBA	Abstract
October 5, 2015	TBA	Abstract
October 12, 2015	TBA	Abstract
October 19, 2015	TBA	Abstract
October 26, 2015	TBA	Abstract
November 2, 2015	TBA	Abstract
November 9, 2015	TBA	Abstract
November 16, 2015	TBA	Abstract
November 23, 2015	TBA (Last meeting of fall)	Abstract
Spring 2015
January 26, 2015	TBA	Coming soon!
February 2, 2015	Soledad Benguria	Exploring Palindromes
February 9, 2015	Jeff Linderoth	Coming soon!
February 16, 2015	Simon Marshall	The Ant Walk
February 23, 2015	Uri Andrews	Coming soon!
March 2, 2015	Jordan Ellenberg	Coming soon!
March 9, 2015	Ali Lynch	Mathematical Games and Winning Strategies
March 16, 2015	Daniel Schultheis	Picture Hanging and Secret Algebra
March 23, 2015	Betsy Stovall	Divisibility Cheats
March 30, 2015	No meeting	UW Spring Break
April 6, 2015	Julie Mitchell	Protein Folding and Robot Dances: Understanding the Basics of Kinematic Motion
April 13, 2015	Jessica Lin	Coming soon!
April 20, 2015	DJ Bruce	Coming soon!
April 27, 2015	David Anderson	Let’s make a deal!
May 4, 2015	Daniel Ross	Coming soon!
May 11, 2015	Grace Deane	Last meeting of semester!

Abstracts

Philip Matchett Wood

Pictures and Puzzles y public manner. We will discuss and solve the problem, learn some probability, play the game, and invent some variants of the game that may, or may not, have similar counter-intuitive behaviors.

Archived Math Circle Material

Archived Math Circle Material

Link for presenters (in progress)

https://www.math.wisc.edu/wiki/index.php/Math_Circle_Presentations