Where can I see Bobby Seagull? A maths workshop and Q&A for school students

No one ever explained to me the point of quadratic equations. I just looked it up:

A quadratic equation is a second-degree polynomial equation written in the standard form ax² + bx + c = 0, where a, b, and c are numbers, and a ≠ 0.

I’m none the wiser but that’s more to do with me. You probably have this down already. But if someone had explained the following (I looked this up too obviously), I might at least have tried a bit harder.

Quadratic equations are used in the real world to calculate:

• Trajectory and Flight: Anything thrown, launched, or kicked travels in a parabolic arc. NASA, military ballistics, and video game developers use quadratics to predict where a projectile or angry bird will land.

• Area Optimization: If a farmer has a fixed amount of fencing and wants to enclose the maximum possible square footage of land, the math required is quadratic.

• Profit Maximisation: Businesses use them to find the "sweet spot" price point. If you raise prices, you make more per sale but get fewer customers. Quadratics map out the exact price that yields peak revenue.

• Safety and Braking Distances: A car's stopping distance is proportional to the square of its speed. If you double your speed, your braking distance quadruples—a quadratic relationship taught in driver's education.

Schools still teach quadratics for several critical reasons:

• Pattern Recognition: They teach students how to break down complex, non-linear problems into solvable parts.

• Gateway to Higher STEM: You cannot learn calculus, physics, engineering, computer graphics, or economics without mastering quadratics first.

We believe travel is one of the most powerful ways to learn. That is why the team at Sweet Chariot takes immense care in designing and refining our educational tours, both within the UK and abroad. We strive to include unique features in every trip.

We’re especially proud of our maths tours. Over the last couple of years we have noticed a demand for them and we have added to our portfolio of maths tours abroad. We have also noticed the world around us, with some uncertainty in certain places and the cost-of-living crisis.

To offer an equally exciting experience, we’re extremely excited to launch our workshop and Q&A with the incredible Bobby Seagull of University Challenge fame.

The idea is for Bobby to share some of his incredible experience and insight so that students attending the workshop get more of an idea of what’s possible for them after school at university and beyond. There are so many opportunities but it’s not always easy to appreciate what you’re working towards whilst you have homework to do and exams to pass.

This is an opportunity to look towards to horizon and make sense of all the hard work. Bobby has done such a remarkable range of jobs, he is the perfect person to highlight some of the options open to maths students. And it’s not only to become a maths teacher, although why not? We can’t all be Bobby Seagulls but we can take something useful from his experiences.

Here’s a short bio of Bobby, taken from his website (with his permission!):

I’m a school maths teacher and Cambridge University Doctorate student. Before moving into education, I was an investment banking trader at Lehman Brothers & Nomura, and qualified as a Chartered Accountant from PwC.

I’m an ambassador for the charity National Numeracy, a presenter for an Open University course on personal finance for young adults, a regular contributor to Radio Four’s Puzzle For Today and a columnist for the Financial Times.

I’m author of The Life-Changing Magic of Numbers (which reached #50 Amazon UK best sellers over Christmas 2018) and co-presenter of the podcast Maths Appeal. With my University Challenge friend, I co-wrote The Monkman & Seagull Quiz and co-presented a BBC TV series Monkman & Seagull’s Genius Guide to Britain. Outside of maths, I’m a long-suffering West ham fan!

We want this workshop to be fun so please submit any problems you want solving, maths related quiz questions or subjects covered. Ask fiendish questions.

We want to make this affordable so we have priced the workshop itself and £95 per person. If you would like to expand on this opportunity, we are also able to offer a tour of the LSE Campus with a current student, a tour of The City of London, overnight accommodation, lunch or dinner in central London.

If you would like to pre-register for the workshop, please visit:

www.sweetchariot.co.uk/bobbyseagull