The Calculus Cult

Max GumbelStaff WriterIn a small room across from the library, five Samo students open up  books so voluminous that most scholars would faint at the sight of them. The students congregate around two flat screen televisions, where they listen intently to a lecture from their instructor via video chat, all the while keeping their secret pledge in mind.However, this is not your run of the mill cult; these are the students of new Samo math class Calculus D/E.This college-level mathematics course, taught by Malibu High School teacher Brian Corrigan via webcam, is quite the technological endeavor.“So far we haven’t had any technical difficulties,” senior, and Calculus D/E student, Minh Phan said. “Well, except for that one time when a television pretty much exploded.”While sparks did fly, the television didn’t exactly “explode,” and none of the Samo students were harmed in the learning of Calculus D/E. But even with the occasional equipment combustion, the five students see the high-tech classroom as a step above the normal class; they see it as an innovative anomaly.“It is more interactive than a normal class,” senior Lucas Lofaro said. “You aren’t just listening to a teacher talk in front of a board, you are seeing the work on a computer in front of you.”The class, which deals with multivariable calculus and linear algebra, has been taught at Malibu High School for the last four years and is in its first year at Samo.“The D/E class was actually proposed at Malibu back in 2004 when the previous AP Calculus teacher Dr. Louis Leithold offered to teach it,” Corrigan said. “Sometime around 2004, the school board made a decision to try to get as many seventh graders as possible through Algebra I.  Those that passed that course and continued to move on would complete B/C as juniors, and the logical consequence of that is offering the next class beyond Calculus B/C.”However, the number of junior B/C students at Malibu slipped to three last year, and in order to continue the class, instruction had to be extended.“When I heard that the district was purchasing the Cisco Telepresence technology, I thought we could continue the course if we were able to include some of the juniors at Samo,” Corrigan said.Corrigan contacted Steve Rupprecht, a current Samo calculus teacher, who recruited some of his students for the course.“I initially heard about the class from Mr. Rupprecht,” senior Ben Grifka said. “When my counselor told me about it at registration, I knew that the class was actually happening, and I signed up.”Rupprecht also told Lofaro and Phan about the class, but like Grifka, neither was certain it would be available to them.“Ben assured me it was actually happening,” Lofaro said. “I asked him what classes he was taking, and he said he was in Calculus D/E. I thought he was joking at first, and I said, ‘Oh yeah, and I am in Calculus F/G.’”Eventually, all three ended up in the class on the first day of school, only to be joined by two more students. This group of the mathematical elite is composed of seniors Lucas Lofaro, Zane Dufour, Ben Grifka and Minh Phan, in addition to junior Karan Rajalingam. Their daily immersion into the world of Calculus D/E is led by Malibu instructor Brian Corrigan.“[Corrigan] is awesome,” Lofaro said. “He goes with the flow. He’s like the ocean, but not as salty.”Beyond the computer screen lies a small community of unique high school mathematicians: the “Calculus cult.”“Ben is really shy. He and Minh keep making me talk for them,” Lofaro said about his less vocal D/E classmates Grifka and Phan.Lofaro continued his introduction of the group by branching off into the history of his only non-senior classmate, junior Karan Rajalingam.“Karan is an Indian robot ninja,” he said as Grifka and Phan chuckle. “The gods created him from the ashes of cremated mathematicians. He is taking D/E this year and will probably take AP Stats next year because of the mathematics infused in his finely chiseled body.”But how is any calculus society of strange minds and robot ninjas complete without its very own pledge?“Do the pledge,” Phan urges her fellow seniors.“But that’s very secret information about this society,” Lofaro said. “Only people who are abducted can know of our pledge.”Besides the pledge, the distinction of being in such an advanced math course has set the five apart and garnered them a minor celebrity status.“I was in my economics class talking about how math is related to the course, and I said I was in Calculus D/E and all of sudden everybody gasped,” Lofaro said. “Everybody thinks we are so smart.”The students are also bound by an understanding of the class and a passion for math in general.“We’re in the class because we actually care about the subject matter,” Grifka said.Even though their passion makes it easier to comprehend the material, the students still find the class nerve-wracking.“It is not as hard as it seems,” Lofaro added. “It is very intimidating, but it is like an onion, you just have to peel the layers off.”And, after passing Calculus D/E, finding the volume and surface area of that onion will be a no-brainer.mgumbel@thesamohi.com