A Math Summer Program for High School Students

Summer, 2023

First things first:

No math prerequisites, no GPA requirement to apply for the program. All high school students, as well as those who are entering high school this fall, are welcome to apply!

The program will be all free!

Why Choose Our Program:

In this program, you will be able to:

Explore some fun math, or enhance your high school math background, or get early preparation for college-level math.

Obtain certificate/recommendation from college: Upon completion of the program, you will receive a certificate of completion to list in your college applications and scholarships. We can also provide recommendation letters to support your college applications per your requests.

Learn from and work with professional math people. Get insights and inspirations from them.

Interact with other high school students who are also interested in learning some interesting math.

Practice oral presentation and communication ability.

Overview and Guidance:

The program is for high school students to read some interesting math books under the supervision of a mentor. The mentors will be PhD candidates from UCSD math department; they will provide both useful background knowledge and necessary guidance.

The program will provide two reading tracks: the basic track (to enhance high school math learning) and the advanced track (to explore some college level math). You can choose any track to apply for based on your math background and interest. You can also apply for both tracks if you cannot decide.

This program will be in the virtual format with the start time around mid-June, and last about 5-6 weeks in the summer of 2023 (The program start time and period will be very adjustable according to the mentees' and mentor's needs). Over the entire program period, the mentees will meet the mentor online for about 15 hours in total .

Each mentor will supervise a team of up to 5 students to read a book (or do research) together. The team will meet regularly every week online via Zoom (click the link to download if needed).

We are committed to promoting participation from underrepresented groups (such as African-American or Latinx or female students, etc) and underserved school districts. Therefore we strongly encourage high school students from underrepresented groups and underserved school districts to apply to our program.

Once you are admitted to the program, we will assign you to a mentor based on your expressed interests. We will contact you by May 1st with the admission result by email.

Organizers: Ming Xiao (UCSD) and Danna Zhang (UCSD).

Questions and Inquiries: Please send any questions or comments to the email: highschool.math.ucsd@gmail.com.

How to apply:

To apply for participation, you need to complete the form via link: Application link by April 21st, 2023.

Sample Book List:

In this program, you will read a book under the supervision of a mentor. To help us find the right book for you to read, you will be asked to choose the math area that you are interested in when filling the application form. Here is a list of sample books that covers a variety of topics including Combinatorics, Trigonometry, Probability, Precalculus, Number theory, etc. The choice of books is not limited to this list.

(1) A Course in Combinatorics, by J. van Lint and R. Wilson

(2) How to Prove It, by D. Vellemen

(3) Book of Proof, by Richard Hammack

(4) Trigonometry, by I. Gelfand and M. Saul

(5) Basic Topology, by M. Armstrong

(6) Precalculus: An Investigation of Functions, by D. Lippman and M. Rasmussen

(7) Geometry, by E. Moise and Jr. F. Downs

(8) Excursions in Geometry, by C. Stanley Ogilvy

(9) A Friendly Introduction to Number Theory by Joseph Silverman

(10) Mathematical Thinking: Problem-Solving and Proofs, by J. D'Angelo and D. West

(11) Elementary Probability for Applications, by R. Durrett

(12) Introduction to Mathematical Statistics and Its Applications, by R. Larsen and M. Marx