Next month the eighth annual Maths Week will take place throughout Ireland. It will open with "Maths in the City" in Dublin on October 12th and continue until the 20th with "Gathering for Gardner: Celebration of Mind".
Martin Gardner has done wonderful work through his books and articles in Scientific American to popularise maths and enhance public awareness and understanding of it.
Maths Week was started in 2006 on the initiative of Eoin Gill of Waterford IT. It has grown with breathtaking speed to become the most successful event of its kind in the world. All the third-level educational institutes in Ireland, north and south, are partners. And Maths Week is supported by a large number of learned bodies, research institutes, museums, heritage centres and technological agencies.
Maths week is all about raising the profile of the subject and getting across the idea that it is an interesting and rewarding subject to study. It can even be fun!
Thousands of teachers from almost 2,000 schools registered with Maths Week last year,
and more than 130,000 school pupils participated. Thousands more members of the public attended events.
From October 12th to 20th there will be a wide variety of events for students of all ages. Hamilton Day, which commemorates the discovery of quaternions by William Rowan Hamilton, is on the Wednesday, and distinguished mathematical physicist Sir Roger Penrose will present the Royal Irish Academy Hamilton Lecture at TCD. The annual Hamilton Walk, organised by NUI Maynooth, will visit the site of the great man's discovery on the same day.
School teachers and college lecturers volunteer time and expertise to organise and present events during the week. Moreover, professional presenters give lectures, run workshops and manage fun events that are invariably "sell-outs". This year, the leading US maths populariser, Stanford University's Prof Keith Devlin, and Dr James Grime of the Millennium Mathematics Project at Cambridge University will give lectures.
You can log on to www.mathweek.ie to register your school to participate in the many events that will take place. You will also find puzzles and interesting facts on the website.
A quick look at the map today shows that already in Co Louth the following schools are registered :
Rampark NS
Bay Estate NS
St Oliver and St Francis NS Blackrock
Dundalk Grammar School
De la Salle College
Muchgrange NS
Kilkerly NS
Scoil Muire gan Smál NS
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