St John’s College's first ever Maths Study Day

The day began with a talk about Oxford admissions given by Alexander Lawrence from the college’s Access and Outreach team. Afterwards, Mathematics tutors Dr David Seifert and Dr Tom Crawford discussed the MAT test, which is an important part of the application process for candidates wishing to study Mathematics and joint schools at Oxford. After going over a few questions from the 2018 MAT paper, the tutors demonstrated what an admissions interview in Mathematics might be like by working through a typical interview question with a brave volunteer. The consensus appeared to be that it wasn’t nearly as scary as people had imagined!

After lunch in the college’s main dining hall, the afternoon was filled with academic taster sessions, a tour of St John’s College, and a tour of the wonderful Andrew Wiles building, home to Oxford’s Mathematical Institute. Dr David Seifert’s session on “Graph theory and the game of Hex” explored some fundamental ideas in graph theory and showed how they can be used to prove surprising facts about colourings of triangles and that there can be no draws in the game of Hex. Dr Tom Crawford’s session on “Maths vs. Sport” was an interactive take on the various ways one can think mathematically about penalty kicks, marathons and other areas of sport. Both sessions were very popular with the participants.

Before heading home, the participants had the opportunity, over tea and cake, to talk to current St John’s undergraduates and tutors and ask further questions about studying Mathematics at Oxford.

Many thanks to everyone involved for making the Maths Study Day such an informative, engaging and enjoyable event.