African Institute for Mathematical Sciences, Rwanda
26 – 30 March, 2022
Kigali, Rwanda
Workshop aims and goals
The goal of this workshop is to provide a platform for educators from across the African continent to discuss implementation, sustainability, scalability, impact, good practices and challenges for a range of mathematics education initiatives. The workshop is a smaller-scale follow-on from the Cross-Pollination in Mathematics Education 2019 Workshop (Edition 1), that was held at AIMS Ghana. The workshop will target three different groups:
- A core team of local and international teachers, scientists, researchers and community leaders, that have long-term involvement in a collaboration of maths education initiatives across the African continent. This collaboration is centered around groups who organize maths camps in different African countries, which constitute one of the key initiatives;
- Invited participants that are in the position to play a key role in initiating, scaling and expanding future initiatives;
- Educators and representatives of Rwanda-based organizations with potential to impact the educational landscape of the mathematical sciences in Rwanda.
By bringing these actors together, we hope to achieve cross-pollination of math education initiatives on a wider scale, and the creation of a pan-Africa community that can share expertise and join forces for initiatives across countries and cultures.
A key component of the workshop will be to develop a strategy for 2023 and the years to come, in particular the planning for larger-scale follow-on meetings. We hope that this workshop provides a platform for maths educators to share insights, ideas, challenges and plans for future initiatives in maths education.
Overview
The workshop consists of two parts. The first part lasts 2 days and involves the core team. The second part lasts 3 days and is intended for follow-on activities with a subset of the core team, potentially involving a broader audience.
- Part 1 (26-27 March): The first two days will be a discussion-driven workshop allowing participants to share their experiences and visions, and formulate goals for the future.
- Part 2 (28-30 March): The second part of the workshop will involve school visits for experiential activities with students in a few selected schools not too far from Kigali.
Each day will build upon the previous days and the leading topics will be:
- How is change in mathematics education being achieved ?
- How to make this change sustainable and scalable?
- How does it impact development in Africa?
- How did the pandemic affect maths education in Africa, which were the challenges and which were the solutions that worked out well?
- Virtual math camps and projects that took place since Edition 1 of the workshop.
- Follow-on discussions on community of practice as started at Edition 1 of the workshop.
- Future projects, math camps, meetings.
Key outcomes of the workshop include
- Theory of change including pathways for impact of mathematics education in a broader context.
- How to convert existing successes into new scalable initiatives.
- Identifying opportunities of using technology as an enabler for learning and reaching communities.
- Future activities.
For more information, see
Organizing Committee
- Franca Hoffmann, Director of SAMI (Supporting African Maths Initiatives), Professor of Mathematics (University of Bonn, Germany), Visiting Associate (Computing and Mathematical Sciences, California Institute of Technology, US), AIMS-Carnegie Research Chair in Data Science (Quantum Leap Africa, AIMS Rwanda).
- Danilo Lewanski, Director of SAMI (Supporting African Maths Initiatives), Researcher at Universite Paris-Saclay and Institut de Physique Théorique, France.
- Herine Otieno-Menya, Director, Teacher Training Program (TTP) at AIMS Rwanda.
- David Stern, Founder of IDEMS (Innovations in Development, Education and the Mathematical Sciences), UK.
Funded in partnership with
- African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS) Rwanda-Teacher Training Program
- Swiss National Foundation “Resurgent topological recursion, enumerative geometry and integrable hierarchies” project
- California Institute of Technology
- Supporting African Mathematics Initiatives (SAMI)