万记拆迁的博客

Since 1985, we have run modeling contests. In fact, COMAP now ad- ministers the MCM R ? /ICM R ? contests at the undergraduate level as well as HiMCM R ? and IMMC R ? at the high school levels All told, more than 23,000 teams and well over 60,000 students competed this past year in one or more of these. COMAP is clearly in the contest business! In what ways does this make sense? After all, we do not believe that mathematical modeling is a competitive sport, and we certainly do not wish to promote it as such. Our original proposal to the Department of Ed- ucation’s Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education (FIPSE), and every public statement we have made since, all clearly state that the purpose of our contests is to promote the teaching and learning of mathematical modeling and applications. After all these years, it’s fair to ask whether this is working, or— more generally—what has been the result of all of this work?