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Welcome to the United Math Circles Foundation

Emulating famous Eastern European models, the program aims at drawing kids to mathematics, preparing them for mathematical contests, introducing them to the wonders of beautiful mathematical theories, and encouraging them to undertake future careers linked with mathematics, whether as mathematicians, mathematics educators, scientists, philosophers, economists, or business entrepreneurs, or in other related to mathematics areas. Topics in the math circle sessions include a variety of mathematical areas beyond the school curriculum; for example, combinatorics, graph theory, linear algebra, geometric transformations, recursive sequences, logic, set theory, multiplicative functions, knot theory, differential equations, applications to natural sciences, computer sciences, and others.

Quotes from colleagues and program graduates

Top students at the math circle also actively participate in organizing and running the monthly contests and delivering sessions on selected topics. Mathematics professors and mathematics teachers from around the San Francisco Bay Area and visiting from around the country and the world constitute the main body of the math circle instructors.

Professor Ravi Vakil. Four-time Putnam Fellow. Professor of Mathematics, Stanford University.

I wish to state in no uncertain terms how important programs for our talented young people are to the future of this country. The best place to develop the highest end mathematical talent is in groups where young people can feed off each others’ excitement, guided by the best honed over decades in other countries. An American version has been in place for a decade and has shown measurable and almost unbelievable results. Now is the time to make these programs a permanent feature of our educational landscape. The community is ready to assist in any way possible. Universities are happy to provide facilities. Professors are happy to volunteer their time. Parents are happy to spend countless hours. And the reason we do this is that when you see these kids “catch fire”, it takes your breath away.

Espen Slettnes, BMC alumnus and instructor.

My shadow and I stood in a complex plane. “What value are you?” I winked and asked. “3435i”, said he, and he asked me mine. I said I was 33+44+33+55. “That’s what I am, but times i”he replied. Our eyes met and danced as we added and multiplied and exponentiated and tertiated until we reached the magnitude of beauty, in the silence of ∞, where I saw my true self. I spoke no words but the simple language of the universe. I rose and vaporized into numbers, integrated with the Universe, and we became 1.

Professor Gabriel Carroll, BMC alumnus. Perfect IMO 2001 score. Four-time Putnam Fellow, Ph.D in Economics from MIT.

The Berkeley Math Circle was really critical in my development. It was the best method available not only to get a flow of mathematical ideas and problems to think about each week but also to meet other interested students and professional mathematicians from all over the Bay Area. You get stimulation from exchanging ideas with other people that you don’t get from reading books at home. I can also testify to the usefulness of studying mathematics even for students who don’t plan on doing it as a career. For someone who wants to go into, say, law, policy analysis, philosophy, economics, or computer science, the kind of logical, abstract thinking that mathematics develops is really the best preparation. I realize that the Circle is most interested in attracting students whose lifelong passion is for mathematics, but it also helps others along the way.