"My passion for problem solving skyrocketed"

The ETH Math Youth Academy is a long-term programme in which students can participate throughout the year. They start from scratch and slowly build up more and more knowledge. How is the programme set up?

I have developed a special curriculum that allows students to participate in the Academy over several years: In the first year, students take the introductory course, where I select topics that are appropriate for students who have not yet done extracurricular mathematics. Then, in the second year, students can stay in the introductory course, move to the intermediate course or take both. The same happens in the third year: they can stay in the intermediate course or go to the advanced course or do both.

Everyone can take as much from the programme as they want. I have some students who are in all three levels. Some students go to the advanced level even though it is a bit too difficult for them, but they do their best and still learn something. Or maybe the introductory level is too easy for some students, but they just take it to make sure they have a solid foundation before taking a more advanced course. This is why I have called the programme "Academy".

Some of the students commute for hours by train to attend the Academy. The interest of the students in the way mathematics is done there must be extremely high. Can you say something about how this comes about?

The programme is designed to allow the students to grow. The topics get more difficult over time, but the increments are so small that they don't even notice them. Some students attend just out of curiosity to see what their friends are doing here every week. They come and like it so much that they say, "Wow, this is so interesting, so exciting! I'll come back next week." And then they just keep coming back. Some attend the academy for one or two years, while others stay for several years and reach such a high level that they win medals in international competitions like the Mathematics Olympiads.

Is one of the objectives of the Academy to prepare the students for the Olympiads?

Preparing for the Olympiads is part of what we do, and sometimes a number of our students take part in international competitions as members of the Swiss team. Mathys Douma, for example, has won a gold medal at the 2023 International Mathematics Olympiad. This is the second gold medal for Switzerland since 1991.

And then there is the European Girls' Mathematical Olympiad, known as EGMO, in which Switzerland took part with four participants, two of them were students at the Academy.

Is the Academy a preparatory course for university studies? If so, what do the participants learn at the Academy that prepares them for studying mathematics or other subjects at ETH Zurich?

The programme is not a preparatory course for prospective ETH students. But it is of course obvious that many of our students enrol to study mathematics at ETH because they can start with a very good momentum thanks to the Academy. They are better prepared and can benefit from their knowledge and problem-solving skills in their first and second year at ETH. But even if they don’t study math, they have practised analytical and creative thinking, learned to write proofs and think outside the box.

Say you read a philosophy book in a foreign language, maybe French. If your French is not perfect, you will struggle with trying to understand what the individual words mean. But if you are fluent in French, your focus while reading the text is on the deeper content and the actual philosophy. In that way, when our students attend ETH later, they will get a lot more out of it.

You mention the social aspects of the Academy and that it is important for students to belong to a group of like-minded people. Can you explain this in more detail?

At the Academy, our students meet like-minded people with whom they can share their interests and learn to work together on difficult problems. Sometimes a solution requires input and ideas from several students. They learn to build on each other's ideas and to spend hours together working on a problem. Thanks to the Academy, friendships are formed that may last a lifetime.