Canada/USA Mathcamp

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The Canada/USA MathCamp is a five-week-long summer program for students gifted in mathematics. Rather than training students for contests or providing courses for credit, Mathcamp, as it is usually known, aims to introduce them to the various branches of "cool math" they are otherwise unlikely to discover until well into their college years, if ever. Mathcamp attracts many talented students each year, including some MOPpers.

Mathcamp was founded in 1993 by Dr. George Thomas, who recognized that students interested in mathematics frequently lacked the resources and camaraderie to pursue their interest. Mira Bernstein of Wellesley College became the director when Thomas left in 2002 to found MathPath, a program for younger students. Mathcamp is held each year on a different college campus in the United States or Canada. Past locations have included the University of Toronto, the University of Puget Sound, the University of Washington, Colorado College, Reed College, and Colby College.

Mathcamp admits about 110 students yearly through an application process that includes solving problems from an online quiz and two letters of recommendation, but no grade reports. The process helps insure that the students who are most passionate about math come to camp, and not necessarily all-around perfect students. Graduate student mentors teach most of the classes, while undergraduate junior counselors, who are required to be Mathcamp alumni, do most of the administrative work. Also, each year there are a number of renowned visitors, who have included John Conway, who comes almost every year, and the late Serge Lang.

Classes at Mathcamp come in several levels of difficulty, and usually there are at least four classes going on during any given class period, so every student can find something that interests them almost every time. Topics include higher math such as group theory, topology, and category theory, as well as basic proof techniques.

Since Mathcamp is as much designed to let students interested in mathematics meet each other as for them to meet math, staff, and occasionally the campers themselves, organize a number of non-mathematical events such as field trips, hikes, and game tournaments. The campers also enjoy a great deal of freedom and are expected to act responsibly. In this way, Mathcamp often eases the transition to the full freedom and responsibility of college.

[edit] Mathcamp culture

Campers play many games including Set, Mafia, Mao, Bughouse and The Game in their free time as well as silly games such as Scream Toes, Color or Country, Poison Pinky Samurai Sword, and Rock Scissors. In the last two years, campers have organized musicals. Recently, many campers and staff have started speedcubing, a trend that more or less started with the arrival of Shotaro Makisumi and was amplified by the organized order of 51 quality speedcubes for campers in 2006. Participants often play "The Game of Four" (use a word only if it is four bits or less) and "The Way of Prime" (using words which are prime in lengths). In addition, at least two artificial, constrained languages, FoodTongue and Mood(y) Loquacious, are commonly spoken, with specialized vocabularies to fit the environment in which they were formed: Foodtongue, although lacking huge amounts of vocabulary, syntax, and grammar, has words for "camper", "staff", infinity, exponentiation, and other common expressions at Mathcamp.

[edit] External links

• Mathcamp website
• Mathcamp Forum moderated by

Mathcamp Deputy Director David Savitt