This is an annual international competition to raise awareness of women’s ongoing contributions to the mathematical sciences; the Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) and Math for America are sponsoring an essay contest.
For over 21 years, this contest has helped to encourage women and girls to study and pursue an active career in mathematical sciences and to promote equal opportunities and equal treatment of women and girls in the mathematical sciences.
This post provides information about the Association of Women in Mathematics Essay Contest and how you can be a winner. See the table of content below.
Table of contents
AWM Essay Contest
This competition is open to students in the following categories: grades 6-8, grades 9-12 and college undergraduates. Candidates must submit an essay based mainly on an interview with a woman in a mathematical career. The winners will receive a prize, and their essays will be posted online on the AWM website.
The essays will be based primarily on an interview with a woman currently working in a mathematical sciences career.
Competition Benefits:
- Each category has a first-place winner (middle school, high school, and diploma) and the main prize winner selected from these top three finishers. There are also usually 0-3 honorable mentions in each category.
- The winners (including mentions worth mentioning) will receive a cash prize, membership in the Association of Women in Mathematics, and a certificate and their name and their affiliation will be published in AWM’s newsletter. In addition, all essays will be published online, and the essay of the Grand Prize winner will be published in the newsletter.
AWM Essay Competition Eligibility
The competition is open to students in grades 6-8, 9-12, and college students.
The annual international competition is ONLY open to grades 6-8, grades 9-12, and college undergraduates.
This competition is to be taken in the U.S.A. If you are an international student and you wish to study in the United States of America.
How do I apply for the AWM Essay Competition?
Interested applicants can submit their online application form via the link provided: Submission Portal
A valid submission contains the following information:
- A biographical essay about 500-1000 words, mainly about an interview, about a woman currently working in a mathematical career.
- A short (about 100 words) biographical sketch of the student candidate. This biographical sketch should include the student’s name, grade level, school, and mathematical interests.
- Information about the student
- Student’s name
- Address of student (or parent)
- Phone number or email address of student (or parent)
- Information about the subject of the biography:
- Name
- Address
- Phone number and/or email address
Association of Women in Mathematics Essay Contest Application deadline
The association of Women in Mathematics Essay Contest 2023 application is not ongoing currently.
Essay Subject. You may interview and write about any woman in a mathematical sciences career. Here are some suggestions for finding possible women to interview:
- Female math teachers.
- Female professors in mathematics at a local college or university (you can try looking up the school’s website and looking for the mathematics department; many departments list their faculty and email addresses).
- Consider other mathematical departments at colleges and universities, such as applied mathematics, computer science, statistics, physics, engineering, finance, etc.
- To find mathematicians from underrepresented minorities, you may want to try the website for the National Association of Mathematicians (NAM), the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE), or the Society for Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS).
If you would like to be put in contact with someone who has agreed to be interviewed for this contest, please contact AWM Essay Contest Interviewee Coordinator Dr. Joanna Bieri ([email protected]). Please note that interviewee contacts will only be given out for requests received by January 10 each year.
Suggested Interview Questions. The following questions are suggestions for what to ask your interviewee during the interview:
- What motivated your interviewee to pursue a career in the mathematical sciences?
- What kind of work does she do?
- Does she have any advice for students who are interested in pursuing a career in the mathematical sciences?
- What is your interviewee’s educational, family, and cultural background?
- What are your interviewee’s hobbies?
All submissions become the property of the Association for Women in Mathematics.
Contact information:
If you have any problems with the submission of your essay, please get in touch with Dr. med. Heather A. Lewis (organizer of the contest) (hlewis5-at-naz.edu).
Association of Women in Mathematics Essay Contest FAQs
Absolutely! The contest is open to all students in these grade categories. The only gender restriction is that the person interviewed must be a woman.
You can read about her before you interview her and use that information to decide which questions to ask her, but your essay must be based on the interview you conduct yourself.
First of all, be sure to thank the woman you interviewed! It would also be nice for you to ask at the end of the interview if she’d like anything she said to be “off the record” and to offer her the chance to read the essay before you submit it.
In conclusion
Today, competitions like this have helped many women build exceptional careers in the mathematical field.
With the Association of Women in Mathematics Essay Contest, equal opportunities and equal treatment of women and girls in the mathematical sciences are promoted.
In addition, winners of this scholarship get a cash prize and a certificate, and their name and their affiliation is published in AWM’s newsletter.
This is an opportunity. You can’t afford to miss it.
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