Announcing SCUDEM VIII 2023 Challenge Period
20 October–13 November 2023
Download and post our flyer (PDF, 362KB) to share news of SCUDEM 2023.
SCUDEM VIII 2023 is supported by MathWorks.

Student teams will be provided a copy of MATLAB® and tutorials. See below.
General Information about SCUDEM
SCUDEM — SIMIODE Challenge Using Differential Equations Modeling is a 3-student group modeling challenge that runs over multiple days culminating in a 10 minute video which is reviewed by at least 3 judges. Teams and Coaches may meet remotely. Team submissions will be judged Outstanding, Meritorious, or Successful.
Teams choose one of the Challenge Problems provided in the areas of
- physics/engineering,
- chemistry/life sciences,
- social sciences/humanities,
and develop a model using differential or difference equations and a presentation.
Read the Complete Rules for details of the challenge.
See problem statements and results for past events in our wiki. SIMIODE's YouTube channel features presentations of past Outstanding Award recipients.
Consider volunteering as a Coach for SCUDEM VIII 2023. Plan to start working with your team before SCUDEM begins in order to help prepare these energetic students for the modeling experience.
SCUDEM needs judges. Consider volunteering as a Judge for SCUDEM VIII 2023. Hundreds of colleagues from academe, business, government, and non-profit sectors have volunteered their time and enjoyed giving feedback to young modelers on their work in SCUDEM
Watch the Collegial Conversation webinar from 27 September 2021, conducted by Brian Winkel (Director SIMIODE) and Anthony Stefan (Florida Institute of Technology) for practical advice for Coaches and Student Challengers. The slides of the presentation include helpful links to details and guiding materials.
The Outstanding Team from SCUDEM V 2020, Miles Pophal, Chenming Zhen, and Henry Bae, from Florida Institute of Technology, Melbourne FL USA has published their model as a paper, Using Differential Equations to Model a Cockatoo on a Spinning Wheel as part of the SCUDEM V Modeling Challenge, in the Rose-Hulman Undergraduate Mathematics Journal, Volume 23, Number 1. The team was coached by Anthony Stefan, graduate student at Florida Institute of Technology.
MathWorks software information
We are pleased to offer all participants (team members and coaches) a complimentary MATLAB & Simulink license as well as MATLAB and Simulink training materials that will teach everyone how to use MATLAB for differential equation modelling and visualization. For registered teams and coaches you can visit this webpage and press "Request Software" to acquire your license. MathWorks customer services will send you a license key within 48 hours. You can then use this key to install MATLAB following the instructions from video.
We will have a live Workshop featuring SCUDEM problems entitled ``Differential Equations Modeling with MATLAB," for all in early October 2023 and then will make a recording available as well in case you cannot make the live workshop.
Further, you can experience and learn about MATLAB immediately after registration here at these helpful sites.
- MATLAB Onramp
- Essentials of Math Modeling - Basic Programming in MATLAB
- Essentials of Math Modeling - Difference and Differential Equations
SCUDEM is administered by SIMIODE, a non-profit Community of Practice focused on a modeling first approach to teaching differential equations.