Information for Coaches

Registration is open. There is no registration fee to be a coach.

Participants in SCUDEM need a coach to help prepare and guide them for their experience in this modeling challenge. The challenge is designed for 3 person student teams, so you would be working with 3 students during the period leading up to the start of the Challenge.

Coaches are not allowed to assist students during the Challenge period 19 October–11 November 2024, so its important to identify potential participants early and work with them prior to the challenge. The Judging Period will commence shortly after that, with judging typically completed by mid-December.

Please read the complete rules for SCUDEM IX 2024.

Benefits of Coaching

The essence of SCUDEM is the modeling and team experience for each student and the professional networking of students, faculty, and colleagues in business, industry, or government.

• Offer students modeling opportunities with differential equations and permit focus on modeling and mathematics.
• Help students develop visual and verbal communication skills.
• Make contacts with others interested in modeling in their coursework or using modeling in their career.
• Connect faculty colleagues who teach differential equations.
• Come away proud of what your student team can accomplish.
• Meet enthusiastic and ambitious young people interested in STEM disciplines.
• Help your team change their perspective on mathematics from a classroom discipline to a living tool for real-world problem solving.
• Foster the value and applicability of differential equations.

In the 2019 article Building mathematics self-efficacy of STEM undergraduates through mathematical modelling in the International Journal of Mathematical Education in Science and Technology, Jennifer Czocher and her colleagues, Kathleen Melhuish and Sindura Subanemy Kandasamy, have found that interventions, particularly in the form of SCUDEM—SIMIODE Challenge Using Differential Equations, "...can promote students' mathematics self-efficacy."

Role of the Coach

SCUDEM engagement demonstrates the usefulness of differential equations in modern problem solving. The mentorship of extracurricular mathematical education can develop students beyond usual differential equations education thresholds. See the teacher perspective from Dr. Matthew Dobson, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, Amherst MA USA.

The role of the coach for each team is to prepare the team members for participation in SCUDEM, and NOT to assist in any way with modeling efforts during the Challenge Period itself. Read the complete rules. Indeed, both coaches and team members will be asked to abide by a SCUDEM Integrity Statement which says:

• Coach Integrity Statement:

  I will not provide assistance to any SCUDEM participant during the challenge period Saturday 19 October–Tuesday 12 November 2024.

• Student Integrity Statement:

  I will not accept any animate assistance, including from our team coach, with regard to the SCUDEM problems during the challenge period October 19–November 12 2024.

We expect teams to coordinate and work together virtually and/or in person, especially since many teams have members in different geographical areas. Once the Challenge Period begins on 19 October 2024, keep offering moral support and be sure that students are maintaining a healthy life balance.

Before the Challenge Period

• Organize the team
• Meet with team members to discuss technical materials
• Go over past SCUDEM modeling problems and student submissions
• Help students develop good presentation skills and concise writing and communication efforts
• Go over the requirements for SCUDEM
• Stress the strict ten-minute limit to the submitted team video.

Before the Challenge Period begins, coaches should stress the need for the team to settle on one of the three problems offered (and not carry forth with several problems’ analyses) in the first day or so and move on model building on that one selected problem. Furthermore, coaches should stress that there is no one right answer. SCUDEM is about the modeling process as applied to the problem of choice. Formulating and communicating efforts are of utmost importance.

Coaches need to emphasize that ALL team members must participate in all aspects of SCUDEM, modeling, writing, and presentation. Make sure students understand what is expected of them in terms of delivering a 10-minute video presentation to be uploaded in Unlisted mode to YouTube by one minute before midnight (11:59 PM) Eastern Time zone on the last day of the Challenge Period, 12 November 2024.

Coaches may interact with team members during the Challenge Period, but under NO CIRCUMSTANCES should there be technical discussions about modeling efforts. Failure to abide by the SCUDEM integrity statement will result in a disqualification of the students' submission. For students, this is THEIR chance to develop and grow. Coaches, let students bloom.

Things Coaches Can Do

1. Form a team
   • Try class members, math club members, posting a flyer, word of mouth, contacting a colleague at a smaller college about promising students without their own team
   • Seek a diversity of skills, e.g. not all programmers, not all dreamers — a blend
   • Make sure students know there could be modeling and learning experiences outside their area of study.
2. Meet with your team to go over SCUDEM
   • Timeline, requirements, expectations
   • Involve prior challengers if possible
3. Share readings concerning modeling principles and good approaches
4. Talk about how to select which problem to do
   • physical sciences or engineering
   • life sciences or chemistry
   • social sciences
5. Go over complete modeling cycle
   • From assumptions to model
   • Model building
   • Parameter estimation or data fitting
   • Revisiting reality
   • Solutions and interpretation
   • Communicating results in video presentation
6. Stress general modeling strategies
7. Point out differential equation solutions methods
8. Make sure student access to computation and production tools are in order

During the Challenge Period

• Visit with your team informally to see if they are making progress.
• Ask about their pace, their attention to schoolwork and personal life, as well as time on task for SCUDEM.
• Be sure students are aware of rules and expectations.
• Email students to give encouragement and mental breaks.
• Ascertain if students are getting enough rest and maintaining a rich student life.
• Do not discuss the model itself or students' strategies.

After the Challenge Period

1. Celebrate making it through the Challenge. Remember, there is no perfect solution, and missteps are a road to growth.
2. Meet with the team to listen to their trial, tribulations, successes, and feelings about modeling, math, and team work.
3. Watch some of the other team submissions once Judging period is over.
4. Add thoughts to the Forum for next year's challengers, coaches, and judges.