This pilot project aims to provide connections between women in high school with an interest in Math and Sciences, and women at the University with similar interests. It is meant to introduce students in high school to the University. It is non-competitive and the aim is not to search for talented individuals, but rather to encourage young women in their pursuit of Math and Sciences. The project is being run by the Mathematics department at the University of Wisconsin in Madison and supervised by Dr. Gloria Mari Beffa, Dr. Concha Gomez, Dr. Gabi Meyer, and Prof. Leslie Smith. Participating students come from Memorial, West and East High Schools.

The program is run as follows: twice a month the students meet with mentors at the Math Department in the UW during one and a half hours in the evening. Mentors are female undergraduate Math/Physics and Engineering majors and also graduate students in Math. The supervisors provide projects and students and mentors work together on the projects. The projects are not meant to test students, but they are intellectually challenging. They are designed to facilitate intellectual and social interaction between the students and the mentor, but they also teach students mathematics and applications beyond their knowledge from high school. There are projects at several levels, from Geometry to BC Calculus, so students with many different backgrounds can participate. At the end of the first year of the program there was a meeting in the Mathematics Department where the groups were asked to present their work. Faculty, teachers and families were also present in this event.

September 2004-April 2005

Projects and groups:

1. Of dominoes, trominoes, tetrominoes and other games. Meant for students who had not had a lot of exposure to algebra. Participants: Ashley Crawford, Ming Feng and Erica. Mentors: Sharon C. Garthwaite and Kathryn Rouse in Fall, Emilie Wiesner in Spring, supervised by Gloria Mari-Beffa.
2. Apollonian gaskets and fractals, or, how adding fractions the wrong way can be intriguing!! For students with algebra background but no Calculus. Participants: Avalon Gulley and Yi Ding. Mentors: Xuan Hien Nguyen and Emilie Hogan (in Fall), supervised by Gloria Mari-Beffa.
3. Chaos and Strange attractors: the Lorentz model. For students with Calculus. Participants: Sonali Ray, Annie Loevinger, Eyleen Chou, Alba Calderon. Mentors: Erica Mcgrath, Rebecca Shapiro and Kathryn Bjorkman (in Fall), supervised by Gloria Mari-Beffa.

September 2005-April 2006

Projects and groups:

1. Apollonian gaskets and fractals, or, how adding fractions the wrong way can be intriguing!! For students with geometry background. Participants: Annalisa Cravens, Ritika Batajoo, Claire Kerby, Sarina Schwartz, and Suvai Gunasekaran. Mentor: Sharon Garthwaite. Supervised by Concha Gomez.
2. Chaos and the Lorenz Equations. For students taking Calculus. Participants: Elisabeth Cai, Cori Hay. Mentor: Julie Simmons. Supervised by Leslie Smith.
3. Kotani's ant on polyhedra: a project in metric geometry. For students with geometry background. Participants: Ella Weise-Moore, Beth Voelz, Abbie Hill, and Kristina Stephenson. Mentor: Chelsey Green. Supervised by Gabriele Meyer.