What's the Center (of Math)?

Got my #WhatsTheCenter swag today! Thanks @centerofmath What's your answer to http://t.co/uiuLHgXofd? pic.twitter.com/N4kiQfFtDH

— Michael Wilkinson (@mwilkinson3) March 28, 2014

NEMATYC 2014 Conference: On the Road with Math

NEMATYC 2014 Conference:  On the Road with Math
April 4th and 5th, 2014
Middlesex Community College, Lowell, MA

The Center of Math travels to the annual New England Mathematical Association of Two-Year Colleges

I had the privilege of traveling with the Worldwide Center of Mathematics to attend the annual NEMATYC conference hosted in Lowell, MA. Short for the New England Mathematical Association of Two Year Colleges, NEMATYC this year was located roughly a 45 minute drive from our location in Cambridge. We had a booth close to where the main meeting rooms were located, and we got to peddle our books to professors between lectures.

The conference was a fraction in size of the JMM conference I attended in Baltimore at the beginning of the year, but the traffic at our booth was surprisingly comparable. Nearly everyone I spoke to took a genuine interest in our company, and I was encouraged by how enthusiastic all the educators at NEMATYC seemed to be about teaching. We got plenty of requests for desk copies, and even spoke with a few people about their ideas for new textbooks.

As a student at a five-year university, I’m a little removed from the idea of a two-year college. Most of my thoughts on community college come from the show “Community”, about a group of aimless failures and drop-outs, so I was rather impressed by how practical and career-oriented everything appeared. In fact, I got a far stronger feeling that these schools were preparing students for a successful future, I would say, than most four-year universities offering degrees in basket-weaving and eighteenth-century French literature.

All this is to say I am encouraged by the opportunities two-year colleges open up for students, and I was pleased to see the way the people at NEMATYC were working to build such a strong mathematical foundation in their classrooms.  Because of my confidence in the quality of the Center of Math’s textbooks and math resources, I’m personally hoping we see more two-year colleges adopt our books in the near future.

If you'd like more information on the Worldwide Center of Mathematics or NEMATYC, please email me.

-tw

Center of Math YouTube Scavenger Hunt

May 15, 2014 - The winners of the first-ever Center of Math YouTube Scavenger Hunt have been drawn!

The first $50 Amazon Gift Card winner is Bailey G., who was the first to complete the challenge.

The two randomly drawn winners were David M. and Heather H.

92% of respondents correctly answered the final challenge problem.

Missed the hunt? The annotations have been removed so as not to disturb studying students. Here's a list of the clues and the final challenge problem.

• To start the hunt, take the blue pill or the red pill. Then multiply them.
• This rule is necessary to find the derivative of sin(x^2)
• An integral that forgot its manners
• How long was Noah’s Boat? 
• I’ve had it with these #$%& vectors on this #$%& plane!
• Please enter your password again to verify your identity
• Snoitcnuf Girt
• Before you continue, make sure your integration skills R squared away!
• The Center tweeted a link to this video on April 11th
• The angry piece of merchandise
• At Least you’ve made it this far, probably

A student has 5 heavy textbooks to carry around. The masses of each textbook in grams are 966, 340, 955, 1722, and 662. What is the average mass of this student’s textbooks?

___ Mass Ave.

Answer: 929


______________________________________

May 1, 2014

The Worldwide Center of Mathematics is sending you on a scavenger hunt. You'll solve math-related clues to reach a final challenge problem. Submit the correct answer at www.centerofmath.org/hunt for your chance to win a $50 Amazon Gift Card!

Our Trip To JMM14 In Numbers!!!

JMM 2014 - Baltimore Trip

The Center of Math traveled south from their headquarters in Cambridge, MA to attend the Joint Mathematics Meetings 2014 in Baltimore, MD.  The conference is the largest mathematics meeting in the world, attracting over 6,000 students, educators and more.  The Center of Math brought along a video camera and created a short video showing some of the numbers behind the trip.  Enjoy!

Worldwide Math Shorts

Brought to you by the Worldwide Center of Mathematics, Worldwide Math Shorts is a brand new collection of videos introducing important basic and foundational mathematics concepts. The videos are now available free on the Center of Math YouTube Channel.

Here at the Center, we are dedicated to providing 1) top-to-bottom coverage of the concepts you need to know and 2) the additional resources you’ll need to master them. Worldwide Math Shorts, featuring Tom Lewis (Northeastern University ‘15), was created to better serve the needs of math students, instructors and the greater community. The collection is comprised of six parts, including the basics of derivatives, integrals, matrices, probability, trigonometry, and vectors.

The topics were chosen to provide viewers with a better understanding of the early concepts essential to executing advanced calculus, differential equations, or linear algebra. Short and sweet, the videos are great for any aspiring mathematician, and serve as especially helpful “refreshers” for those using Center of Math textbooks. Each video introduces basic definitions and concepts followed by worked examples.

As we continue to expand our collection of study/help videos and resources, we want to hear from you! Which topics do you need help with? What kind of video or topic would you like to see the Center of Math produce next? Leave your comments or send your thoughts to info@centerofmath.org.

Center of Math Productions are recorded in the Center of Math Studio Classroom space in Cambridge, MA. The Center of Math was established to strengthen the math community by providing free and affordable resources for all. 

Check out one of our Worldwide Math Shorts below!

A Textbook Carol | The Evolution of the Textbook Publishing Industry

Hello math lovers! We know all of you love math... and you probably love the holidays, too, so we thought we would combine the two to give you a fun and informative infographic about the evolution of the publishing industry! We drew inspiration from the classic "A Christmas Carol" that we thought you'd all be able to relate to. We hope you enjoy it!

 

Though it's a topic you might not have ever thought about, publishing has an impact on you whether you are a student, professor, collector, or just a math enthusiast. We appreciate those of you who choose the Center of Math and support our mission of finding ways to make math affordable and accessible!

From the Center of Math, Happy Holidays!!!

P.S. If you'd like a print-friendly version of this infographic (at full size), send us an email at info@centerofmath.org.