Math is a fundamental skill in any education, but at Mathworks Junior Summer Math Camp, students explore the fun in fundamentals. The program serves around 200 students mainly from San Marcos in grades third through eighth. The young scholars spend two weeks improving their skills in math, with the goal to inspire kids to use these skills when pursuing careers in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. This program is led by Texas State University with support from San Marcos Consolidated Independent School District.
The Mathworks program was started by Max Warshauer in the early 90s. He founded the Honors Sumer Math Camp in 1990, which is a prestigious six week program for high school students. In 1996 he extended the love of math to younger students by establishing the Junior Summer Math Camp. He had attended a program at Ohio State when he was in high school that mixed young scholars with college graduates. The experience of learning higher level math skills in high school led him on a path that included a PhD and becoming a Regents’ Professor at Texas State University.
“Once I became a full professor, I thought, what would I really like to do? I enjoyed doing math, but I thought it would be really interesting to begin a program for younger kids, so I began a camp modeled after what we did at Ohio State to prepare kids to do higher level and advanced math,” Max said.
Over the years, the camps grew, and they now offer the Junior Summer Math Camp, which is a half-day program for grades third through eighth, as well as a JSMC Residential program for grades sixth through eighth, which is an immersive full-time, in-person camp with the goal of developing students into creative and critical thinkers. The Honors Summer Math Camp is offered to grades nine through twelve and is a six week program, which sees hundreds of applications from students all over the world.
“[The camps] evolved based on teaching kids to think carefully and deeply about problems and to prepare them to do higher level math and science, but it turns out it prepares them to do everything in life, doing advanced problem solving of all kinds, where they go in any career in STEM,” Max said.
Data collected from surveys through their Honors camp showed that around 80% of students go on to a career in STEM.
The camps not only benefit grade school students but undergraduate and graduate students at TXST as well. Max has been collaborating with his wife Hiroko Warshauer to merge his skills teaching math with her skills teaching math education at TXST.
“Students who are undergraduates participate in the camps and get an early introduction to teaching. Graduate students are linked to creating new activities, teaching in the camp and doing research about the teaching and learning of math, so it really gets woven into the fabric of the university, with the camps being a laboratory for developing, piloting and testing new ideas for teachers,” Max said.
The camp is truly a collaborative effort between not only students and staff at TXST but the San Marcos community as well. Mathworks has had a strong relationship with the San Marcos Independent School District, which provides the space at a local school for the Junior Summer Math Camp to be held, as well as providing transportation for SMCISD school students and cafeteria meals. Other supporters like the H-E-B Tournament of Champions have sponsored around 40 scholarships for the program.
There are endless success stories from the camps that have impacted the lives of local San Marcos students. San Marcos High School 2025 Valedictorian Benjamin Keller has attended each faction of the camps, starting in the JSMC, then doing the Residential camp and even the Honors program. He continues to be a part of Mathworks as a camp counselor before heading to Princeton this fall.
“They come back and set the tone for new campers, so it’s really this whole community,” Max said. “We’re really fortunate to have a partnership with the district, together with supporters like H-E-B and the Lions Club and our Mathworks advisory board, and the university that provides tremendous support for the whole program, with our chairman, Dean, provost and president all being wonderfully supportive of what we do and understanding how this is part and parcel to what we do in math and what we do in math education.”
Hiroko added that out of the 177 students that participated this year, 100 are from San Marcos.
“We hope it benefits all students, but we’re happy that the community is also able to partake in a resource that the school district provides,” Hiroko said.
Max said the math camp is distinguished from other summer camps due to the partnership with the university and the school district, which he is incredibly grateful for. “The district is totally wonderful to open its doors and provide this kind of support in place to house a camp,” Max said. “We couldn’t do it without them.”
The Junior Summer Math Camp happens every year and is open enrollment.