Davis High School Wins
First Annual High School Math Challenge

On Monday, April 8, 2004, Project GRAD Houston (Graduation Really Achieves Dreams) hosted the First Annual High School Math Challenge. Forty-three students from five Project GRAD High Schools in H.I.S.D. participated in the half-day event including a “When Am I Ever Going to Use This?,” team challenge, and a history component.

Davis High School students win the First Annual High School Math Challenge. Special Guest Dr. Cathy Seeley, President-elect of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) presented the award to the students and spoke on the importance of learning math and using math to solve real problems. Seeley used the movie and the incidents surrounding Apollo 13 as a backdrop for real world problem solving.

“The First Math Challenge is unique in that it offers an opportunity for students to see math in action in the real world and how it is used to solve problems in everyday life,” says Beatrice Moore-Harris, manager of the High School Math Program, Project GRAD Houston. “The history component offered students a chance to learn more than dates and facts, but also about how people and cultures have contributed to and benefited from mathematics. The goal is to have students view themselves as mathematicians building on a legacy of rich traditions and knowledge that generally goes unrecognized.”

The Math Challenge provided Project GRAD Houston high school students with an interactive event to work as a group using leadership, communication, and interpersonal skills as part of the problem solving process. The purpose of the event is to have students look beyond math as “number crunching” and isolated facts, and to consider all its forms, depth, and complexity.

“To sum it up, providing students with a solid foundation in mathematics requires that history, relevancy and skills acquisition be adequately and deliberately addressed in the regular school curriculum,” says Moore-Harris. “Many students found the challenge different than they envisioned, and like the History Challenge the best.”

For more information about the Project GRAD Houston Math Challenge, please contact:

• Beatrice Moore-Harris, Manager of the High School Math Program, Project GRAD Houston, at Work (832) 325-0377, Cell (713) 299-7345
• Ann Stiles, Senior Academic Director, Project GRAD Houston, at Work (832) 325-0467, Cell (713) 201-0622
• Melissa Carroll, Director of Public Relations, Project GRAD Houston, at Work (832) 325-0301 or Cell (713)253-6953.

Project GRAD Houston is a nonprofit, comprehensive, community-collaborative, school program serving over 48,000 students in 73 public schools in the Houston Independent School District (H.I.S.D.). Founded by Jim Ketelsen, former CEO of Tenneco, the program was initiated in the H.I.S.D. District in 1993-1994 and has a proven track record of increasing graduation rates and improving student academic success.

Project GRAD now serves 133,000 students nationally in 217 schools in Akron, Atlanta, Brownsville, Cincinnati, Columbus, Kenai Peninsula, Knoxville, Lorain, Los Angeles, Newark, and Roosevelt, New York. For more information on Project GRAD Houston or to make a contribution, please visit www.projectgradhouston.org

Test Your Math History:

Round 1.   Math History   

This round of competition was based on important people, places, and events in math history.   A list of the people, places and events to be used in this round were provided to the school sponsors weeks prior to the Challenge. Students worked as a group to respond to each question.   This Challenge lasted 30 minutes with points will awarded for each correct answer.

Sample Questions:

• Why is there so little known about the mathematical contributions of the early Chinese and Indians and so much known about the ancient Babylonians and Egyptians?
  (The Chinese and Indians used very perishable media like bark and bamboo to store written records. The Babylonians used baked clay tablets and the Egyptians used stone and papyrus.)
• Who was the first known woman to make a substantial contribution to the development of mathematics?
  (Hypatia of Alexandria)
• He was the son of a slave and had only a few semesters of elementary schooling, yet he taught himself algebra, geometry, logarithms, trigonometry, and astronomy.  He also learned on his own how to use a compass, sector, and other instruments to make astronomical predictions, including eclipses.  
  (Benjamin Banneker)
• Name one of the three Greek mathematicians who were considered as the “mathematical giants” of the 3 rd century B.C.  
  (Euclid, Archimedes and Apollonius