Hillel Raz, Director
Email: mathcircle(a)math.ucdavis.edu
Phone: Monday-Friday (business office)
(530) 752-0827
Phone: Saturday mornings ONLY (computer lab): (530) 752-0828
Office location: Mathematical Sciences Building Room 2125 (I can meet you here by appointment)
Postal address:
Explore Math
Math Sciences Building
U.C. Davis
Davis, CA 95616
Caution! If you decide to send us something via post, then also email us to alert us to check our mailbox.

Parents: cell phone reception is extremely poor in the math department. If you need to reach your child during a practice, you may use the computer lab number listed above. (Note that this is a public phone.)

The program website is located at http://www.math.ucdavis.edu/~exploration/mathcircle

The first day

Please arrange for your child to arrive at the Mathematical Sciences Building by 9:15 a.m.

Students should bring:

a notebook, at least one pencil and/or pen, and an eraser. Coloured pencils/pens may come in handy.
mathematical enthusiasm!

On January 6, from 12:30 p.m.-1 p.m., we will be hosting a Parent/Guardian Open House.

Please attend: this is a great opportunity to meet the other parents or guardians, arrange car pools, etc. We will try to answer any questions you have about this program during this time.

We will be distributing a phone list. This sheet will contain the phone numbers of parents and guardians. Please let us know by by January 4, 2007 if you would like to be excluded from this list. You may contact us at mathcircle(a)math.ucdavis.edu.

Location and Directions

Math Circle will take place at the Mathematical Sciences Building Room 2112, from 9:30a.m. - 12:30p.m., January 12-March 15, 2008.

The Mathematical Sciences Building looks like this:

Floorplans of MSB can be found here: http://www.math.ucdavis.edu/contact/building_maps

You can view an interactive campus map here: http://cevs.ucdavis.edu/map

The closest public parking on weekends is Parking 46 (P 46), located south of the Academic Surge Building. On weekends there is no charge for parking.

Directions to VP 46 from San Francisco:

Drive on Interstate 80 East.
Just before reaching Davis, turn north on Highway 113 North (note that you will encounter the 113 South turn-off before reaching the 113 North turn-off).
Take Highway 113 North a short distance to the first exit at Hutchison Drive.
Turn right on to Hutchison.
Drive (east) about 1/2 mile on Hutchison until you reach La Rue Drive.
Turn right on to La Rue Drive.
Continue on La Rue Drive around the left bend and turn left into VP 46.
Parking permits cost $6.00 per day on weekdays. Permit dispensers accept quarters, one-dollar bills, five-dollar bills or VISA and MasterCard. Parking is free on weekends and observed holidays, except when special event parking is enforced.

Directions from VP 46 to Mathematical Science Building:

When you exit VP 46, take La Rue Drive eastward, and then turn left onto California Avenue.
Go down the bike/foot path that California Avenue turns into. Pass the Watershed Science Research Center and Academic Surge Building.
MSB is on your left. It is a large white building with a huge metal sculpture in front. There is a plan floor located on the walls of the front area/atrium.

Academics

Math Circle will take place every Saturday morning, 9:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m., except the weekend of President's Day. (Please see attached schedule.)

Classes will be taught by graduate student instructors chosen for their passion for teaching and promise of research excellence. Brief bios of instructors and speakers may be found at the end of this letter.

We are very excited about the classes this winter, and we think our students will be too. Here are the titles and a brief description of each course.

The Theory of Tilings

John Steinberger

Have you ever seen a work of art by M.C. Escher, the Dutch master of optical illusion? If so you have likely seen some examples of tilings: self-fitting shapes that replicate to fill an entire plane without gaps. In this course we'll take a look at some of the math behind these intruiging patterns. We'll examine lesser-known "multilayer tilings" and their connections to number theory. We'll see that high level mathematical techniques are sometimes needed to answer seemingly simple questions, and conversely that simple observations can unravel impossible-looking problems. With careful practice and a bit of guidance, this course will allow you, too, to master the zen of tilings.

Variety of topics in Applied Math

Adam Miller

We will study a variety of topics in applied math, from both practical and theoretical perspectives. We will explore math through games, experiments, and demonstrations. Subjects will be drawn from the following areas, with student input.

Chaos theory, through the historical perspective of population biology
Fair division and apportionment
Error correcting codes
Scaling issues in biology
Voting systems
Counter-intuitive probabilities
Mathematical modeling

Counting, Chances, and Optimization

Eddie Kim

How do you count a list of things? What if the list is really really large? Sometimes, a very large and difficult counting task becomes much easier by trying to count your list in a different way. Efficient counting (enumerative combinatorics) can be used to discuss questions of chance and outcome (counting probability). It also serves as a great springboard to discuss some questions about choosing an optimal solution among a large list of possible solutions, perhaps even an infinite list of solutions (optimization and linear algebra).

Expectations

Our mission is to have fun doing great math.

To quote the Boston Math Circle: ``While the courses are mathematically rigorous, the atmosphere is friendly and relaxed. We want our students to feel free to express their ideas, to suggest their own approaches, and to make mistakes. We work in a spirit of friendship, cooperation, and enjoyment of one another.''

We expect students to maintain an atmosphere of respect and cooperation. Any students found severely disrupting such an atmosphere will not be allowed to return to the program.

Schedule

Instructors and Speakers

Instructors

$picture of graduate student$ The Math Circle 2008 graduate student instructors are:

Yvonne Lai
Marion Moorer
Tom Denton

Yvonne is a sixth year graduate student studying hyperbolic geometry and geometric group theory. She has been involved with various summer programs, including the high school camps COSMOS(California Summer School for Mathematics and Science) and the USA/Canada Mathcamp. Yvonne has won awards for teaching and community involvement. Her main interests are in hyperbolic geometry and geometric group theory.c

Marion is a fourth year student working in topology in general and in knot theory in particular. She got her bachelor's degree from U.C. Santa Cruz - hence she was a proud banana slug. She is an excellent cook and can whip a variety of meals from simple ingredients. She also throws great parties, with many different themes.

Tom is a second year student in the Ph.D. program. His mathematical interests are in representation theory symplectic geometry. Tom never learned to drive, figuring it was cheaper to ride a bike. Years later, he is a graduate student in mathematics in one of the most bike-friendly cities in the country. He earned his bachelor's degree in mathematics and political science at the University of Oregron, in Eugene. While there he worked as a bike messenger and taught a class for an alternative high-school program at the Center for Appropriate Transport.

Speakers

Lucas Sabalka received his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2006. He is now a Krener Assistant Professor at U.C. Davis. He triple majored in college, in mathematics, history and computer science along with two minors. He is interested in geometric group theory. He is also an avid ultimate frisbee player with a deadly forehand.

Chris Berg received his undergraduate degree in mathematics from U.C. Santa Barbara in only three years. He is currently working on his Ph.D. with professor Monica Vazirani in representation theory. Along with his beautiful wife, Chris is the proud father of an adorable girl, Kai.

Peter Tingley is a graduate student at U.C. Berkeley studying representation theory, random surface theory, and vertex algebras. He spent the past year teaching 8th grade mathematics at Frick High School, part of the Oakland Unified School District. He received his undergraduate degree from Waterloo University in Canada. He has bicycled twice from Berkeley to Davis.

Marion Moore is a graduate student at U.C. Davis studying topology and knot theory.

Tim Lewis is an associate professor at U.C. Davis. He received a Ph.D. in Mathematics from the University of Utah in 1998, and he holds Masters degrees in both mathematics and physiology. He has held positions at McGill University, University of Utah, and the Courant Institute. His research interests are in Mathematical Biology and Neuroscience, and he is the faculty advisor for the Explore Math program.

Emily Peters is a graduate student at U.C. Berkeley studying Von Neumann algebras. She is a former student and former and future staff member of the Hampshire College Summer Studies in Mathematics, a summer program for high school students. Recently, she has taken up pottery.

Directors

Hillel Raz has taught different subjects, ranging from mathematics, to chemistry and Hebrew at various levels. He taught geometry at an innovative high school (recently featured on Oprah!) where he dealt with students from a variety of backgrounds and different mathematical abilities.

Hillel is a strong believer in challenging each and every student and setting the ceiling before setting the floor. He was not pushed in junior high and high school, partially due to a language barrier, and hence he strives to find a common language with each student in order to be able to reach, teach and learn from every student.

Welcome

Classes/Workshops

Apply

Math Circle Ad

Math Problems

Contact/Directions

This program is sponsored by the University of California, Davis College of Letters and Science and the University of California, Davis Mathematics Department with the support of National Science Foundation VIGRE grant #DMS-0135345.

Photo credit for this site goes to the USA/Canada Mathcamp and the UC Davis Math Department .