BEAM Students Make Summer Plans

BEAM students and families gather for the summer program presentation.

After spending two summers at BEAM, what do BEAM students do next? They might want a summer break, staying home or traveling with their family for vacation. But many students want another productive thing to do with their time! Each winter, we encourage our alumni to apply for summer programs to help broaden their knowledge, explore enriching learning experiences, and spend their break in a meaningful way. This is especially part of BEAM’s mission to prepare under-served students for future STEM careers. We aim to support students by helping them to applying to various STEM orientated summer programs, and our unscientific surveys of STEM professionals prove what the BEAM audience already knows: summer preparation in middle school and high school opens the door to STEM success in college and beyond.

BEAM alumni Teo and Jennora share their experience from summer programs they have attended.

On January 26th, BEAM students gathered at NYU’s Courant Institute for the annual Summer Program Information Session. This event’s main focus was to start the process of selecting summer programs and preparing summer applications. The information session began with a presentation highlighting the importance of applying to summer programs and how to go about the application process. We also had a panel of four BEAM alumni who answered questions and discussed their experience in different types of summer programs. After hearing about the different options, students broke out into groups by grade in order to review a list of their personalized summer program recommendations. As the beginning of the year goes by, we encourage our students to start their applications as soon as possible in order to give themselves the best opportunities. Overall, the information session pushed students to start thinking about their pathways towards STEM careers in addition to giving students the chance to hang out with the BEAM family.

BEAM students: it’s not too late to apply to amazing opportunities for summer 2019! Contact your year leader to learn more.

A Look Into BEAM Saturday Classes

In fall 2017, BEAM launched BEAM Next: a program that offers a range of prep and enrichment classes to students from grades 8 to 11 (we’re adding 12th grade opportunities next year!). Nearly every Saturday, students gather at Courant Institute*, the mathematics building on New York University’s Campus, to engage in classes catered to their interests in STEM. The year has been broken into three trimesters featuring different courses. A students day typically consists of two blocks of class and lunch. The morning classes, Things You Need to Know (TYNTK), are centered around the crucial topics students need to learn based on their grades.

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8th grade students Yilin and Caroline team up for a combining like terms game in their Algebra class.

The topics grow as BEAM students grow. TYNTK covers:

• 8th grade: SHSAT prep (fall) and Algebra 1 (winter, spring)

• 9th grade & 10th grade: How to survive high school, a two-year sequence that covers everything from studying to outlining an essay to email management to calendars and organization

• 11th grade: SAT/ACT prep (fall, winter) and college admissions support (spring)

• 12th grade: college admissions support (fall, winter) and getting ready for college (spring)

Starting left, Zeina, Maryam, and Bryan walk through a problem with help from the Supplemental Algebra instructor Barbara.

Right now, 8th grade students enrolled in Saturday classes are taking either a Supplemental Algebra or Fast Paced Algebra course in order to ensure they have success on the Algebra 1 Regents in June, which opens the door to future math courses (especially Calculus!). Our Algebra classes are designed to help build a deeper understanding of the content and build on what is taught in their school’s curriculum. One student, Yilin says that “algebra class has helped reinforce a lot of past knowledge and has also helped to advance the foundation of important math skills”. The class isn’t meant to accelerate their learning but to add depth towards the material they already know. Algebra at BEAM gives students the opportunity to expand their problem solving skills and brings a fun challenge towards topics that they may have already learned.

After students leave Algebra, they scatter to their enrichment courses. Current offerings including computer programming in Python, graph theory, and evolution. We’ll share more about enrichment in a future week!

*We would like to thank the Courant Institute, the Center for Mathematical Talent, and New York University for the use of their classrooms, which are generously provided to BEAM at no cost.

New Names, Same Great Programs!

At BEAM Discovery 2018, two students work together to solve a math problem.

Here at BEAM we are incredibly excited for the new year! We are already diving into hiring our summer staff and admissions for our summer programs. We anticipate many highs and lows as waves of college and high school acceptances for our current BEAM students roll in. As BEAM braces for all the fresh and familiar that the new year is bound to bring, this seems like the perfect time to debut our programs’ shiny new names. Throughout the fall of 2018, BEAM staff spent some time carefully thinking about how to update our program names to make sure they truly showcase what our programs are about. After much thought, we are excited to announce our new program titles.

Our summer program after 6th grade, formerly BEAM 6, will now be known as BEAM Discovery. We’ve made an even bigger change to our other program, BEAM 7. Recognizing that we now support students from 7th grade through college, we’ve renamed it the BEAM Pathway Program, which comprises the summer program and all that comes beyond. The idea behind these new names is that first you discover BEAM, then you walk down the pathway with us, which culminates in college graduation! There are many steps in the BEAM Pathway Program, each with its own name: BEAM Summer Away (the residential summer program), BEAM 8th Grade Support, BEAM HS Support, BEAM College Prep, and BEAM College Support.

Of course, being our usual nerdy selves, we had to throw around some rather mathy name suggestions before we settled on this sensible line up. While we ended up choosing names that are a little more practical and prosaic, we felt these whimsical, mathematical suggestions deserved an honorable mention as runners-up:

• 7th Grade Summer Program: BEAM Axiom

• 8th Grade Saturdays: BEAM Hypothesis

• 9th-10th Grade Saturdays: BEAM Conjecture

• 11th-12th Grade Saturdays: BEAM Infinity

• College Support: BEAM Omega

As fun as these names were, we wanted to make sure that our new names clearly conveyed what each step of our pathway is really about. We believe we have captured each BEAM program with the name we have chosen, and we are excited to fully transition to using our up-to-date names here in 2019!

Students at BEAM Summer Away 2018 explore a waterfall together!

Thank You for All Your Support in 2018

Way back in July 2018, when the sun was shining and the days were long, we asked BEAM students at our summer programs to take a moment to reflect on what they had learned, how they had grown, and to say thank you to all the supporters who make BEAM possible.

Today, in December 2018, having just passed the shortest day of the year and with 2019 just around the corner, we thought we would brighten your day by sharing some of their thank yous.

To those of you who have donated to BEAM in 2018 or a past year: these thanks you are written to each and every one of you. Your support is what makes BEAM possible.

At this time, we also want to encourage new donors to get involved and returning donors to increase their contributions. All new or increased donations are subject to our π Matching Campaign.

Without further ado, here are the words of BEAM students sharing what they learned at BEAM and what they are thankful for.

Emely, 7th grade: I learned to play Splendor.

Ethan, 7th grade: Because of you, I made new experiences. [drawn with cards from a Set deck]

Mohammad, 7th grade: I learned Binary. 01010100011010000110000101101110011010110111001 --> "Thanks" in Binary

Hawa, 7th grade: Thank you for the amazing time at the water park!

Erick, 7th grade: I learned the Pythagorean theorem.

Kaitlyn, 6th grade: I was not interested in math at first. I only did it because I was good at it, but BEAM has taught me that math is so cool and used all around us. Thank you for donating and opening this opportunity for me.

Liz, 6th grade: I love the fact… that BEAM teaches us math that is more advanced than our grade level. l love math! Thank you for donating.

Sefora, 8th grade: The thing I learned this summer was: proving and disproving conjectures.

Ousmane, 6th grade: “In my experience at BEAM I learned many new experiences and sequences at “Weird World of Numbers.” For example, Fibbonaci, geometric, also arithmetic.

Ousmane chose to be photographed with Giselle, who taught his class on the “Weird World of Numbers.”

Gabrielle, 6th grade: I really like the new perspective I have on math. MATH!

Andrew, 8th grade: I grew a lot in mathematics. I learned about things I thought wasn’t possible and solved them. So that’s why I love BEAM!

Nasheily, 6th grade: I learned how to win games that use math and how to use proof by contradiction.

Jack, 8th grade: I have made so many friends and I had a great time in all my classes. I learned that zero was an even number. BEAM is the best camp ever.

Chloe, 6th grade: I learned about the Pascal triangle and it was very fun and interesting.

Nate, 6th grade: I learned how to build circuits. :)

Andony, 6th grade: At BEAM, I learned to think like a logician. Thank you!

Precious, 6th grade: Without BEAM, I wouldn’t have learned all these new math strategies. Thank you!"

The entire team of staff and students at BEAM wish you a happy new year. Thank you for all your support and remember that it’s not too late to give to our π Matching Campaign today!

How would you do at a BEAM trivia night?

What does it look like to combine puzzles, trivia, and a bit of math? BEAM's Slightly-Mathy Trivia Nights do just that, challenging guests to work together with students on fun, weird, challenging puzzles. If you want a taste of what that means, here are four rounds from our 2018 event. Scroll carefully as we’ve included the problems and then the answers on a next page. (Warning: Round 4 is hard!)

For Round 1, answer these questions first, and then click on the Round 1 link below to match each answer with a mathy symbol or drawing for double points!

1. What ocean borders on the US, Canada, Russia, Greenland, and Norway—but not Ghana or Namibia?

2. What is the last name of a famous tennis player whose first name is Bjorn?

3. What is the word for an old leather or metal glove?

4. What word means “placed more bullets into my gun”?

5. What public company has the highest market capitalization?

6. What programming language that is a dialect of Lisp is also a word for a devious plan?

7. In baseball, a line blank is what happens when the batter hits the ball hard with a low arc. What word fits in for the blank?

Thanks to all the BEAM students, supporters, and staff who joined us for trivia nights in Los Angeles and New York. Please join us next year! Sign up for our mailing list to get announcements about events in 2019.

BEAM's End-of-Year Newsletter is Here!

Yesterday, BEAM's quarterly newsletter arrived in the inboxes of all our subscribers! The newsletter featured:

• A look at the very first semester of BEAM College Support.

• The announcement of our Year End π Matching Campaign

• A recap of recent events at BEAM, including our annual Yale Splash field trip and Trivia Events in NYC and LA

• "What We're Reading (and Watching)"

• Information on our job openings for summer staff

Missed it? You can read the newsletter now.

Make sure you don’t miss the next one! Sign up for our mailing list.

The Second Annual BEAM Los Angeles Math Competition

Kenny, Mayisa, and Adib were the top three individual competitors. Adib answered 17 of 18 questions correctly in the individual round!

On Saturday, 60 middle schoolers and their coaches joined BEAM for the second ever BEAM Los Angeles Math Competition. Of these, fully half (30 students!) attended BEAM 6 last summer.

The competition featured an Individual Round and a Team Round along with time to share solutions and an awards ceremony. Awards were given to the top three individuals, the top three teams, and the top school overall (based on how their multiple teams did).

Want a feel for the competition? Here’s a question that stumped students during the team round:

What is the biggest number which can be evenly divided by 12 with no remainder that you can make by using each of the digits 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 at most once?

Students clearly loved the event! Here is some of their feedback:

We’d like to thank 9 Dots who generously donated the space for the competition; thanks so much!

Thanks also to all the students and staff of Alliance Richard Merkin Middle School, Berendo Middle School, Clinton Middle School, Equitas Academy #2, Girls Academic Leadership Academy (GALA), Rise Kohyang Middle School, Synergy Kinetic Academy, UCLA Community School, and Virgil Middle School who joined us on Saturday! We hope you had as much fun as the BEAM staff did in organizing this event.

Missed out? Here are some of our favorite images from the event!

GALA students work on the individual round.

Virgil students during the team round.

A student from Equitas Academy #2 dons his Mathletes shirt while working on the individual round questions.

A group of students from Clinton Middle School discuss one of the team round problems.

A group of students from Synergy Kinetic Academy discusses individual round problems.

A student from Equitas Academy #2 is excited about an answer during a presentation of solutions to the team round questions.

The best overall school performance went to the students of Virgil Middle School.

Kaylee and Sharon, BEAM 6 alum, won 3rd place in the team round representing Rise Kohyang Middle School.

From left to right, Jipper, Abraham, Joshua, and Cherokee, won second place in the team round representing UCLA Community School. Abraham and Cherokee are BEAM alum.

From left to right, Adib, Mayisa, M.K. Luis, and Kevin won first place in the team round representing Virgil Middle School.

Last year, BEAM held one math competition for 37 students. This year, we will be holding two and we can’t wait to see how many students show up for our spring competition! See you then!

Recap: BEAM Goes to Fall Yale Splash 2018!

Recently, nearly 70 BEAM alumni had the opportunity to travel to Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut for one of our favorite yearly events: Yale Splash. This program offers students from 7-12 grade to enroll in courses that are taught by undergraduate volunteers in classrooms on campus. The students register online and get to pick their own classes and organize their own schedules. Yale Splash allows students to choose from an array of intriguing topics within many different fields. This year some of the students favorite courses included “Viking Age Iceland,” “The Science Behind Cookies,” and “Sharks: Nature’s Most Misunderstood.”

“In my favorite and most interesting class, “How The Brain Works”, I learned that you actually see upside down but it’s your brain that flips your vision right side up.”

— Ethan Chase, 8th Grade

After classes were dismissed, BEAM students reconvened at the library to meet with their assigned groups for tours. We had three undergraduate volunteers come to help give students a brief tour of campus and lead them to their assigned dining halls. A lot of our older students were especially excited to see a friendly face because Aishat Adekunle, a freshman at Yale and also a BEAM 7 alum from 2013 was one of our tour guides that evening! Although the weather was very choppy, students got see the ins and outs of a college campus. We explored the downtown area, ventured into the undergraduate commons and even got a sneak peek into student housing.

“From this trip overall I learned that college is a lot of work, but now I’m ahead of the game. I’m way more informed about college life than most kids my age so I’m ready for it when it comes in 4 or 5 years thanks to BEAM.”

— Amber Sosa, 8th Grade

After the tours, students were brought to the Yale dining halls for dinner. Fitting to BEAM, one of the dining halls we ate at is named after famous mathematician Grace Hopper. Students got to enjoy various foods and share with each other about their classes and highlights of the day. Afterwards, we all rallied back to buses for our journey back to New York City.

The pictures above feature many of our students throughout the day. The first picture is of 8th graders Yilin and Faoziah enjoying their 2 hour bus ride. Next, 11th grader Brianna and 8th grader Jeremiah show off their Yale Splash t-shirts. More 8th graders are shown hanging out; Ethan, Jeremiah and Amber are enjoying a quick break in the library’s lounge. Although it was quite rainy, Aishat got to reunite with some of her old friends from BEAM, Teo, Silvio, Rashik, Maria, Amanda and Elisa, before taking the students on a tour. Lastly, we have the same group eating at the John Edwards dining hall with Betty, one of the day time staff for the trip.

BEAM 7 Students Look to the Future: Contemplating Careers in Math

When we ask BEAM 7 students what they see themselves doing as an adult at the beginning of the summer and then again at the end, their replies are always all over the map. Oftentimes answers change from one end of the summer to the other, and it can be hard to read from their response how their experiences at BEAM might have shaped the careers that they see for themselves in the future.

For example, mathematician is the only career that appears on both of Karen’s lists from before and after the summer; her responses seem to point towards a settled desire to pursue math. Meanwhile Amara only includes mathematician on his list at the end of the summer, hinting at a dramatic discovery of math. But their actual stories are more complicated, and at the same time richer: more reflective of what it really means and how it really feels to encounter advanced mathematics.

Amara doing a scavenger hunt, code-breaking activity.

Even though mathematician doesn’t appear among the careers that Amara can see himself pursuing before BEAM 7, his words on our opening survey already read like those of a budding mathematician.

I hope I become better and I want to achieve to become more of a person who likes challenge.

And when he writes about working on a math problem for days, it is clear that he is pressing towards that goal of embracing the struggle that comes with mathematics: It was so frustrating, but I never gave up.

John Urschel, former pro-football player and math PhD student at MIT, had something similar to say about his own earlier encounters with mathematics: It was so hard... And it was a struggle that I really loved.

Amara’s journey over the summer touches on a theme that is common to the study of advanced mathematics. Success in mathematics often means learning to love not just the mathematics, but also the toil that comes with it.

By the end of the summer, when we ask Amara what he likes about math, his response is a single word, one that captures the precise sentiments of many seasoned mathematicians: Challenging.

Karen folding origami.

On the other hand, Karen brought her desire to be a mathematician with her to BEAM and her goal to pursue mathematics did not waiver throughout the program. However, she did learn more about how it feels to pursue challenging mathematics, and the kind of community you want to have in your corner as you tackle difficult math problems.

This is what Karen had to say about what she learned at BEAM:

People aren’t really how you would think they are. There will always be someone with their arms wide open to pour feelings out to.

The larger mathematical community isn’t always a supportive one, especially for students of color. BEAM is out to change that, and we aren’t alone. Mathematicians of the highest caliber are beginning to recognize that humanity along with all her children, their history, their hurts and highest hopes, have a place in the midst of math. In the words of Francis Su, former president of the Mathematical Association of America and math professor at Harvey Mudd:

We are not mathematical machines. We live, we breathe, we feel, we bleed.  If your students are struggling, and you don’t acknowledge it, their education becomes disconnected and irrelevant.

Math doesn’t happen in a vacuum, devoid of feeling or emotion. As Karen wrote about her experience working on a math problem for days: It was stressful, but after solving it I was satisfied.

Pursuing math is stressful! It is satisfying and rewarding and beautiful, but also (and often) stressful. The stress and the struggle are necessary aspects of pursuing math, worthy aspects of expanding the mathematical frontier. But the struggle doesn’t have to be a lonely one.

Every mathematician needs a shoulder to cry on from time to time, and that is what Karen found at BEAM, a community she can count on.

Only time will tell whether Karen and Amara choose to pursue being a mathematician as a future career, but they have already encountered currents that can carry them to the very heart of mathematics: the exhilarating joy of struggle and the strength of a supportive and understanding math community.

BEAM's Post-Summer Newsletter is Here!

Today, BEAM's quarterly newsletter arrived in the inboxes of all our subscribers! The newsletter featured:

• Information about the first summer of BEAM Los Angeles

• An invite to join BEAM for an upcoming fast-paced night of slightly-mathy trivia, 10/29 in NYC and 11/13 in LA!

• What our alumni did this summer

• "What We're Reading"

Missed it? You can read the newsletter now.

Make sure you don't miss the next one! Sign up for our mailing list.