Scienteens Lab gives students taste of university

Further maths students from Years 12 and 13 went to the University of Luxembourg in Belval on Tuesday, 11 February, to take part in a Scienteens Lab workshop run by the mathematics department. The workshop, entitled ‘Linear optimisation and population dynamics’, gave students an overview of mathematical modelling and showed them how real-world problems can be modelled and solved using mathematics.

The day gave our students a real taste of university-style mathematical learning. With a lively, experienced educator, displaying the eccentricities expected of a high-ranking mathematician, giving first-class lessons in the rigours of mathematics, the students found themselves immersed in the beautiful mathematical world. The workshop covered, among other things:

• Examples of linear optimisation problems
• Graphical resolution of a two-variable problem (using GeoGebra)
• The simplex algorithm
• Linear, exponential and logistic growth
• The SIR model and its implementation in GeoGebra.

– By Chris Brown, Secondary maths teacher