Math Club Established at Saline High School, Along with Math Center Resource Available to all District Students

Students in Saline Area Schools seeking help with their math homework acquired a comprehensive resource recently, as The Saline High School Math Club and associated math lab were unveiled by president and founder, senior Ava Ignacio.

Ignacio told school trustees and administrators about the endeavor at the most recent board of education meeting.

Under the guidance of math teacher Trisca Beasley, Ignacio built the club’s tutoring component to mimic the way traditional writing centers offer students help with their English homework.

She said while math has always come easily to her, writing has been a bit more of a challenge.

“I know myself, as a left-brain individual, very analytical thinker, I’ve been forever grateful for the writing center,” Ignacio said. “It has provided me with so much help in ways I cannot express because I’m not the best when it comes to creative thinking.”

Math club members will staff the math lab.

Ignacio said membership in the math club is open to all students at the high school, and is the perfect place to be for anyone with an abiding interest in math and for those who enjoy helping others.

“So far we’ve already recruited over 20 members, which is amazing considering the COVID times,” she said.

All students in the district who are struggling a bit with math can seek help via the math center.

“We are going to provide synchronous and asynchronous math tutoring and resources to students across the district, so K through 12. It’ll be amazing,” she said. “We’re doing that through Equat.IO, which is a PDF editing app. That way we can circle spots of asynchronous work that has been submitted.”

This allows for collaborative instruction and learning.

“If they’re still stuck, we can write down a couple steps for them to get going,” Ignacio said.

Students requiring an extra bit of support can even talk with a math club member in a one-on-one setting.

“We also provide synchronous tutoring through Zoom, which is going to be amazing because I know a ton of people benefit from face-to-face learning,” she said.

Ignacio hopes by next year, high school students will be able to earn credit toward graduation by providing their math tutoring services.

“We eventually want to make the math center in-class high school credit just like the writing center,” she said. “That way, students, whenever they have extra time in math or need a little bit of extra help, maybe through lunch or any free time throughout the day, are able to go into the math center and get help face-to-face with someone who is there.”

Ignacio said she has had nothing but positive feedback from the administration.

“I have had multiple meetings with Mr. (Principal David) Raft and Mrs. (Assistant Principal for Curriculum and Assessment Theresa) Stager, and they are super excited about the idea,” she said.

Math club members will also be affiliated with a prestigious mathematics organization.

“Mu Alpha Theta is the national math honor society, which is a national organization for high schools and colleges,” Ignacio said. “We are in the process of pursuing a national charter so that we can become an actual charter of Mu Alpha Theta.”

This will allow math club members to pursue a myriad of opportunities to bolster their mathematics repertoire.

“Ms. Beasley just received a call a couple days ago, so we are almost there,” she said. “The national math honor society also gives different scholarship opportunities and grants and awards to students who are within it, so we’re super excited for all of our members to be a part of that.”

Ignacio said all that is left now is to hit the ground running.

“I’m super excited to see where it goes in the future,” she said.

The Math club’s website can be found at:https://salinemathclub.weebly.com/about.html

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