By Angela Torres and Dr. Ovie Soto, UC San Diego Mathematics Project
The UC San Diego Mathematics Project, in conjunction with Math for America San Diego, is beginning our Summer Math Academies for 2024. This work is funded by a federal earmark allocation championed by CA Senator Alex Padilla and Congressman Juan Vargas. These Summer Math Academies will have students engaging in fun and rich math tasks while a group of teachers use the classes to strengthen their teaching practices.
During Summer 2024, the project will host five Summer Math Academies in strategic locations for traditionally underserved student populations. One will be held at Montgomery Middle School in Sweetwater Union High School District. The San Diego Unified School District will host one middle and one high school group at Morse High School in Skyline Hills. Oceanside Unified School District will also host two Summer Math Academies at Lincoln Middle School and Oceanside High School.
The UC San Diego Math Project’s leadership team is determined to show that students and adults can help each other learn. The goals of the Summer Math Academies are to: 1) Improve mathematics instruction in schools teaching a high percentage of underserved students in STEM while, 2) Improving underserved students’ knowledge of, and disposition toward, mathematics.
This year, we have two UC San Diego Math Project leaders and nine teacher leaders from around San Diego county leading these efforts, along with 28 teacher participants, and approximately 100 students.
The Morse Summer Math Academy group kicked off their professional development on Saturday, May 18th 2024 with nearly 20 elementary, middle and high school math teachers coming together to do math and have conversations about how status plays a role in groupwork.
Photo # 1 shows teacher-leader Aurmon Harchegani from San Diego Unified and teachers: Janet Gil (Bell Middle School), Aaron Martinez (Paradise Hills Elementary School), Florencia Mendoza (High Tech Elementary Explorer), and Claudia Pruitt (Knox Middle School) working collaboratively on their Origami box math task.
Photo # 2 shows teacher-leaders Brittany Harper (San Diego Unified) and Dr. Curtis Taylor (High Tech High Graduate School of Education) with teachers: Margo Booker (Knox Middle School), Rachael Corrao (Bell Middle School), Elissa Wilson (Lincoln High School), and Andre Izaguirre (Logan Memorial Educational Campus) working collaboratively to find the volume of their origami boxes using cubes and beans.
Photo #3 Shows our group of K–12 teachers working on their math task. We opened up the lesson using a Multiple Abilities launch from the work of Complex Instruction (Cohen & Lotan, 2014), which helps students know that there are many intellectual abilities that are needed for the task today, which is why you will need the ideas from others in your group, helping us expand what it means to do math.
Stay tuned for images of students and teachers learning together in all five Summer Math Academies later this summer!
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