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St. John Brebeuf math students participate in SFU event

The group of four attended the 'A Taste of Pi' program on Oct. 18
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St. John Brebeuf Secondary students Kyrin Feng

Four students from St. John Brebeuf (SJB) Secondary participated in the math enrichment program “A Taste of Pi" at Simon Fraser University on Saturday, Oct. 18.

Kyrin Feng, Cristina Wang, Colin Ellis-Sarauer and Catherine Ellis-Sarauer were among 72 math students from the Lower Mainland to participate.

Professor Dr. Leah Edelstein started the first session with her new research "Mathematics of Flocks and Swarms" to introduce attraction force and repulsion force with algebra equations.

Students learned how the rates of change of distance between things such as birds, ducks and bees reflected their velocity of movements.

In the second session, Dr. Tim Swartz presented his research on “Statistics in Sport with Emphasis of Soccer and Hockey.”

Students learned how to develop coaching strategies by using the power of simulation. In the end, students realized that determining when to pull the goaltender and when to substitute players are but statistical games.

"A Taste of Pi" is a mathematics enrichment program offered by the SFU department of mathematics, the faculty of science, and the Pacific Institute for Mathematical Sciences.

The program challenges students to excel and transforms them into critical thinkers and problem solvers.

Dr. Christine Tsou, math competition team coordinator at SJB, has nominated her students to take part the "A Taste of Pi" program since 2003.