The Math Modeling class at Mass Academy goes beyond traditional high school mathematics curriculum by teaching through open-ended problem solving as well as group work. Throughout the year, we work on MTFC, Modeling the Future Challenge, which is where you and your group pick any topic with risks associated with it and attempt to mitigate those risks using math modeling.
The Modeling the Future Challenge is a math modeling competition where groups of 5 students work together to mitigate a risk using math modeling. Our group's objective was to determine when an individuals mental health crosses a certain threshold and is at an elevated risk for a school-wide attack. We are looking at the effect of bullying, poor home conditions, poor mental health, and more. Our project proposal pushed us forward into the semi-finals and we're looking to go farther.
The Epsilon School Project was our first project that had to do with mathematical modeling. We got assigned groups and had to work together to tackle the problem given to us. There were 7 incoming teachers and we had to figure out which positions we wanted those teachers to teach. We were also given the number of students in each grade and how many students took each class. We had to come up with our own definition of "fair" and support our claim of which teachers go where. We defined fair as having as equal student teacher ratios as possible. We ended up hiring one Art teacher, one Biology teacher, an English teacher, a teacher that teaches French and Spanish, a Math teacher, a Music teacher, and a Social Studies teacher.