Mathematical sciences outreach

4th and 12th July 2023

We are running two Year 12 University Taster Days on Tuesday 4th July and Wednesday 12th July.

The day will consist of a number of hands-on interactive workshops on a variety of topics. There are a number of workshops covering all aspects of mathematics including pure mathematics, statistics, physics and applications of mathematics to the different areas of engineering and computing. The aim of the day is to provide your Year 12 students with a taste of what is on offer at University to those with an A level in mathematics.

More details and application form for the Year 12 Taster Days

Year 10 Mathematics Taster Days – "Why study A level Mathematics?"

Mathematical Sciences ran two Year 10 Mathematics Taster Days on 17th and 26th January  which attracted 530  students and 46 staff from 24 schools across Devon and Cornwall. The day was entitled “Why study A level Mathematics?” and the aim of the day was to provide the students with a variety of mathematical workshops to broaden their view of the subject. 

Workshops were led by staff from Mathematical Sciences and topics included The Monty Hall problem – how to increase your chance of winning a car rather than a goat, Topology – exploring the ideas of shapes, Elementary particle physics – a card game, Counting Symmetries, Guesstimation – how to make sensible estimates of large numbers, Using a WW2 cipher, Magic card tricks and the mathematics behind them, Using the capture–recapture method to estimate the number of bead in a jar and How not to be fooled by the statistics. 

The plenary session given by Dr Jenny Sharp was entitled “Money, Magic, Measures and Maps and Mistakes – what M links them all?”” which provided the students with a lot of reasons why they should consider taking A level Mathematics. The fact that seemed to have the most effect was that if you have an A level in Mathematics, “there is compelling evidence of continued wage returns of up to 11%”; working out how much this could be over your working life showed that it was about 4 years’ salary.

The Year 10 taster day will run again next academic year; details will be sent to schools as soon as the dates are set.

Year 9 Mathematics Masterclasses

Spring 2023 saw the 25th series of the Year 9 Royal Institution Mathematics Masterclasses at the University of Plymouth. 65 students from 14 schools from Plymouth, West Devon, South Hams, Torbay and East Cornwall attended 6 Saturday mornings during January, February and March. Each class covered a different topic designed to engage the students in mathematics that they will not meet at school. There were sessions on Fibonacci and the Golden Ratio (Dr Jenny Sharp), Guesstimation (Dr Martin Lavelle), Topology (Dr Colin Christopher),  Sierpiński’s Triangle (Amy Hooker from the Royal Institution), Cryptography (Dr James P Edwards) with the final session being a carousel of puzzles.

Dr Jenny Sharp started the Year 9 Mathematics Masterclass series at the University of Plymouth in 1996 and to have finally got to the 25th series after the last few years has made this years’ that much more significant. Over 1300 Year 9 students have attended these masterclasses over the 25 series, with the first ones being in their early 40’s now. It would be interesting to catch up with any past masterclass students; if you or anyone you know attended Saturday morning Masterclasses at the University of Plymouth please email Dr Jenny Sharp at jsharp@plymouth.ac.uk.

The 26th Series will run in Spring 2024; details will be sent to schools in the Autumn term of 2023.

International Physics Masterclass

The aim of Particle Physics is to determine and understand the fundamental laws of the Universe. Experimental particle physics is normally only performed by experts, who design, build and run specific experiments, and finally analyse their data to look for new unknown particles.  On the 17th March 2023, Dr Vincent Drach, a visiting scientist at CERN in Geneva, and a member of the Particle Theory group of the University of Plymouth, organised an event as part of the International Physics Masterclass series. Introductory lectures to particle physics were given by members of the  local Particle Theory group: Dr. Craig McNeile and Dr. Vincent Drach. The event was also supported by Dr. James P Edwards, and two PhD students of our group: Maxwell Gisborne and James Hancock.

Approximately 50 Year 11, 12 and 13 students from local schools, became experimental particle physicists for a day.  They used experimental data measured at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, to estimate the mass and lifetime of a specific meson particle. At the end of day, the students shared their results in a video conference, organised by CERN, with students located in Bologna (Italy), Barcelona (Spain), Prague (Czech Republic) and Suceava (Romania).  The students and their teachers also had a live visit of LHCb, a 20 metres long detector located 100 meters below ground,  in which the two proton beams of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) collide.

This event is an annual event and details will be sent to schools as soon as the date for 2024 is set.