Some of the UK’s top maths communicators will visit Orkney schools in early September as the result of a funding boost for Orkney International Science Festival. A £15,000 award has been made by the International Centre for Mathematical Sciences (ICMS) in Edinburgh.

The maths visitors will include Dr Katie Steckles who edits the magazine New Scientist’s weekly BrainTwister puzzle column. Her Orkney schools activities will include a Shape and Symmetry workshop, delivered with illustrator Hana Ayoob. Mathematician and musician Ben Sparks, a former maths teacher, appears regularly on the Numberphile YouTube channel where his videos have been watched over 16 million times. Accompanying them will be Rufus Roberts, who has delivered maths to varied audiences including rough sleepers, refugees and children excluded from school.

Everyone will be able to meet them at the Festival’s Family Day on Saturday 7 September, held this year in the Pickaquoy Centre arena. Outdoors on one of the sports pitches, young people and families will be able to join another project coming to the Festival – ‘Number City’, building towers of cardboard boxes to explore mathematical concepts visually, with more details to come soon.

The Family Day will also feature two mathematically-trained artists who bring together data, art and mathematics in their work. The pattern of flashes from Noup Head lighthouse started Rebecca Kaye developing an image capturing the patterns from lighthouses around the UK coast. Madeleine Shepherd’s sources range from NASA image data to Fair Isle traditions. They will also give workshops in Kirkwall and in the Pier Arts Centre in Stromness.

Festival director Howie Firth says that the maths visits are coming at a good time.

“Schools, like the rest of us, had their activities disrupted by Covid and lockdown, which can be particularly difficult in subjects like mathematics, and sometimes it can seem to be just a collection of techniques to pass exams.

“But mathematics is really more about adventure and exploration, in rising to meet challenges and making fresh, new and beautiful things, and the visiting mathematicians will bring this out in a variety of very lively ways.

“We are delighted with the tremendous support from ICMS which is making this possible.”

The International Centre for Mathematical Sciences was established jointly by Edinburgh and Heriot-Watt universities in 1989 in response to a challenge issued by Nobel physics laureate Abdus Salam in his Edinburgh Medal lecture in the first Edinburgh Science Festival. One of its aims is to stimulate the impact of mathematical innovation on the world. Its director, Prof. Minhyong Kim, is known internationally for his work in number theory. He is particularly interested in a new project which he has named Mathematics for Humanity, aimed at supporting mathematical activities around the world with potential for direct impact on the betterment of the human condition.

Prof. Kim said this week:

“At the ICMS, we believe strongly in the importance of vertical integration of mathematical capabilities in society at large. It is a true delight and an honour to support the Orkney International Science Festival and its splendid programme of spreading quantitative literacy and the deep appreciation of scientific knowledge to the public.”