Summer 2023

MC2 will hold free summer camps for Rising 6th to 13th graders this July.

Our camps give students the chance to participate in a highly communal mathematics experience. These camps are hands-on, minds-on, featuring active math circle activities, where exploration and collaboration are prized.

The lottery for our camps is open. The lottery runs on May 7th. Afterwards spots are available first come, first serve,

You can sign up here.

Rising 6th, 7th, and 8th grade Program

Back of the Yards High School, 2111 W. 47th St.

Payton High School , 1034 N. Wells Ave.

Both sites will run for two weeks from July 10th to July 21st. Sessions will be held from 9AM-noon.

Our middle school camps follow the format of math circles during the school year. Each day of the camp features a welcoming environment, an emphasis on community building, and a main math circle activity.

Rising 9th-13th Grade Program

UIC East Campus, SEO Building, 851 S. Morgan

UIC’s Camps will run from July 10 to August 4th, consisting of four 1-week sessions. You can sign up for 1, 2, 3, or 4 weeks!

Camp will meet Monday to Friday, 9:30AM-3PM. For more information about this program, please also see the UIC-YSP Camp website. You can register for the camp on our registration page or at the UIC website.

Tentative Topic by Week:

  • July 10-14: Number theory and Cryptography
  • July 17-21: Graph Theory and Combinatorics
  • July 24-28: Algorithms and Data
  • July 31-August 4: Applied Mathematics and Modeling

High School Camp with Dr. Eugenia Cheng

Back of the Yards HS, 2111 W. 47th St.

This one-week camp will run July 17th to the 21st, 12:30PM to 3PM. Students who are rising 10th to 12th graders are eligible to attend.

Dr. Cheng writes: “In this mini camp we will explore high level abstract math in an open-ended and accessible way, particularly appealing to visual and hands-on learners. We will emphasize creativity rather than following rules, discovery and investigation rather than facts, choices and possibilities rather than right and wrong, and structures to be built rather than problems to be solved. These ideas are the topic of my book “The Joy of Abstraction: an exploration of category theory, math, and life” which is aimed at high school students and others without advanced math degrees.
In the process we will see how math helps us think more clearly about anything and everything in the world around us, with specific examples including questions of social justice including tolerance, privilege, prejudice and equality. Thus we will see that “abstract” doesn’t mean “irrelevant”, but rather, that abstract thinking can help us understand urgent issues in the world around us. The only prerequisites are curiosity and an open-mind about what math really is.”

Fees & Lottery/Registration Schedule

All of our summer camps are free. The suggested donation for each of our camps is $300 per week on a sliding scale. Families earning more than $70,000 annually are encouraged to donate $150 (half the price of the camp); those earning more than $100,000 are encouraged to donate $300.

Registration for our summer lottery opens on April 11th; the lottery will run on May 7th.

Preference is based on:

  • The number of MC2 sessions a student has attended during the fall, winter, and spring of the 2022-2023 school year.
  • The school a student attends, with priority for children attending CPS schools where the majority of students are from families designated Low Income by CPS.

Beyond these criteria the lottery will select students randomly.