Calculated joy: Why GeekWire’s STEM Educator of the Year built a museum to fix math trauma

Tracy Drinkwater bristles when people — sometimes proudly — declare they “can’t do math.” No one, she notes, would similarly boast about being bad at reading or history. But she understands the sentiment.

Math education, she argues, was designed decades ago to produce NASA engineers, not curious learners — reflected in all-or-nothing grading and a fast-paced curriculum that pushes kids into calculus before high school graduation.

“It ends up making a lot of people feel really stupid,” Drinkwater said.

So the former middle and high school teacher set out to change that by creating math experiences that are playful, exploratory and pressure free.

In 2019, Drinkwater launched the Seattle Universal Math Museum, an initiative that began as a mobile program visiting classrooms, farmers’ markets and partnering with organizations such as the Pacific Science Center and the Museum of Flight. The museum, which goes by the clever acronym SUMM, recently opened its own facility on March 14 — also known as Pi Day in honor of the mathematical constant π.

For her STEM leadership, Drinkwater is being honored at the GeekWire Awards as STEM Educator of the Year, alongside Fidel Ferrer, founder of Portland’s Project LEDO. First Tech is sponsoring the award, and Drinkwater and Ferrer will be recognized at the GeekWire Awards event May 7 at Seattle’s Showbox SoDo.

SUMM has filled its space in Kent, Wash., with displays that cleverly tuck math concepts into puzzles, games and other activities. The museum has already welcomed 1,000 visitors and will host its first school field trip next month. It asks guests for a $5 donation.

Exhibits include:

A giant Etch A Sketch-like device requires two people to work together — one controlling the X axis and the other the Y — to trace patterns such as Seattle streets and landmarks. The task incorporates concepts including linear equations and the Cartesian plane, making graphing tangible through a collaborative drawing challenge.

A motion-capture exhibit transforms visitors into living fractal trees. As participants move their arms, fingers and legs, the camera mirrors and multiplies the movements into branching, repeating patterns that look like cherry blossoms and other trees. The repetition is the essence of fractals, which have real-world applications such as measuring irregular coastlines.

An origami exhibit invites visitors to fold their own own paper cup, octagon, picture frame or other multi-sided shapes like cubes or tetrahedrons. The colorful, symmetrical creations are aesthetically beautiful while also demonstrating concepts of 3D shapes such as vertices, edges and faces.

Other displays explore lesser-known mathematical heroes; tessellations, which are patterns made from repeating identical tiles; and a video game that creates Sierpiński triangles.

“We’re trying to provide the setting for that kind of joyous math that gets people hooked,” Drinkwater said. If you can spark a child’s interest in math at a space like SUMM, she added, that excitement will help them push through the harder work of school math.

SUMM has a 15-person staff and a one-year, rent-free lease at Kent Station. The nonprofit is supported by donations from individuals and foundations, and is holding a public fundraising event May 8 in Seattle. It also receives state and King County grants. When SUMM visits schools, it charges on a sliding scale to ensure access to lower-income communities.

“It’s been a really amazing journey,” Drinkwater said, encouraging people to visit. “And if you like it, donate, because funding is the only thing holding us back.”