Interviews and focus groups with 123 educators and curriculum providers across six states revealed broad enthusiasm for math-civic curriculum, but little existing systematic instruction in these topics. The report recommends developing and testing standards-aligned lessons, supported by teacher training, ready-to-use materials, and sustained funding, to help students understand the mathematics shaping democracy. Phase two, currently underway, will develop math and civics materials and pilot them in several school districts around the United States.

This project is supported by the Hewlett Foundation.

Read the executive summary.

Read the full report.

The post Phase One Report from IMD-USC Math and Civics Project Now Available appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.

Speakers include Rachel Hutchinson, Deputy Director of Research & Policy at FairVote, “a nonpartisan organization working for better elections for all,” Renato Castelo, Director of the Office of Participatory Budgeting, City of Boston, and Brian Brubach, Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Wellesley College.

The event will take place in room H105 in Wellesley’s Science Center.

The post Voter-Centered Electoral Reform Event at Wellesley College appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.

The project also studied single-peakedness, social utility, and statistical fingerprinting of real elections. Although real voter preferences rarely satisfy perfect single-peakedness, many elections come surprisingly close. Condorcet methods perform well on social utility under idealized assumptions, but their advantage weakens with more realistic voter behavior. Statistical fingerprinting helps assess whether synthetic elections resemble real ones.

To read the report, access our data and visualizations, and check out our repository of datasets and code, visit the project webpage.

The post Empirical Analysis of Ranked Choice Voting Methods: Phase 2 Report Now Available appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.

If you would like to be considered for financial assistance to attend the conference or wish to submit a poster, the registration deadline is January 8, 2027. For all other attendees, the deadline is February 12, 2027. Registration is free for those affiliated with Wellesley College.

We look forward to seeing you at Wellesley in March!

The post Registration Now Open for Democracy Exchange: Research and Practice in Dialogue Conference at Wellesley College appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.

The post IMD Affiliates Presenting at the Joint Mathematics Meeting in January appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.

Baigali Nyamdulam and Jordyn Barger will work with Prof. David McCune (William Jewell College) to study the spoiler effect in multiwinner ranked choice elections. They will examine which proportional voting rules are most susceptible to “weak” spoiler candidates, using several different notions of weakness.

Madeline Ashton will work with Prof. Kristopher Tapp (St. Joseph’s University) on a project around computational redistricting algorithms. The mathematical core of all such algorithms involves the generation and splitting of random spanning trees. This project will explore old and new methods of generating random spanning trees, and compare their effectiveness at generating ensembles of voting maps.

Mai Li McGhee will work with Prof. Ellen Veomett (University of San Francisco) to use machine learning techniques to estimate the impact of proposed legal or policy changes on voter registration and turnout. In particular, they will look at the SAVE act and the mail-in-ballot executive order (and potentially other proposed legal or policy changes).

Brendan White will work with Prof. Jeff Wheeler (University of Pittsburgh) to further elucidate the underlying mechanism of Duncan Watts’ “model of global cascades on random networks” in a 2002 paper that determined the factors causing a narrow “cascade window” that differentiated between whether a contagion caused a “global cascade” or merely fizzled out locally in the originating subnetwork. The model relies on binary states of nodes that are flipped from zero to one by an arbitrary threshold of its neighbors being in the one state – and form a connection to case studies in social choice theory (e.g. spread of preferences, surge in candidate popularity, etc.).

At Wellesley College, Farah Rajeh and Nyamal Bangoang Riek will work with Prof. Karamatou Yacoubou Djima on a project integrating mathematical tools like Applied Harmonic Analysis (specifically shearlets) with graph-based methods and machine learning to develop affordable computational biomarkers for early autism detection. Democratic systems rely on equal opportunity and civic participation. Early detection using low-cost, low-tech placental imaging offers a universally beneficial, non-partisan approach to public health. Because placental imaging requires no expensive genetic sequencing hardware and can analyze lower-quality images taken under non-optimal conditions, it is uniquely suited for low-income and rural communities. Bridging the healthcare gap between well-funded urban centers and under-resourced regions strengthens equal access to fundamental healthcare infrastructure, which is a key pillar of a fair and inclusive democracy.

Kate Wepsic and Charlotte Chung will work with Prof. Ismar Volić on a joint project between IMD and the University of South California. The goal of the project is to understand whether topics in the intersection of math and civics are taught in K-12 schools and to what extent, and then develop instructional materials in partnership with a curriculum provider and pilot them in several schools.

IMD is grateful to all our faculty mentors for their support. We are excited about the diversity in projects and student interests with the expansion of the fellows program. Stay tuned for more research updates!

The post Introducing 2026-2027 IMD Fellows appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.

Until now, the program has primarily supported undergraduate research at Wellesley College. Beginning this year, we would like to extend this opportunity to faculty at other colleges and universities who are interested in supervising their own undergraduate students on research projects related to mathematics and democracy. IMD has funding available to support both the students and the faculty supervising these projects.

Projects can span a broad range of topics at the intersection of mathematics (and related disciplines like statistics, computer science, and data science) and democracy.  Theoretical, empirical, and computational projects in voting and social choice, proportional representation, districting, deliberative democracy, and related areas are all welcome.

For faculty interested in participating in the Fellows Program, please write to contact@math-democracy.org with a brief description of the project you have in mind. You should also feel free to pass this information along to anyone you feel might be a good fit for this program.

The post IMD Fellows Program Expands for 2026-27 appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.

Investigating Single-peakedness on Graphical Representations of STV in Scottish Elections – Emma Wong and Wenhao Lu, mentored by Dr. Brian Brubach (Wellesley College) with teaching assistant Valerie Zhu (Wellesley College).

Assessing Fairness in Social Choice Mechanisms: Evaluating Ranking Satisfaction in German Elections – Raina Gao, Mrinalini Sensarma, and Taison Scofield, mentored by Dr. Mostapha Diss (Marie et Louis Pasteur University). And here is the paper resulting from the project.

Minneapolis Ranked Choice Voting – Reese Cartwright and Jenny Chu, mentored by Dr. Natasa Dragovic (University of St. Thomas).

Ballot Generator Models – Arlan Bartfeld, Cloe Chai, and Zifei Zhao, mentored by Dr. Matt Jones (Colby College).

A certain kind of spoiler effect: isolated plurality losers (IPLs) in multi winner ranked choice elections – Arjun Grandhe, Brady Kanter, and Danica Scofield, mentored by Dr. David McCune (William Jewell College).

Multimember Districts Increases Proportional Representation – Zifan Zhao, mentored by Dr. Keaton Quinn (Wellesley College) with teaching assistant Elaine Zhao (Wellesley College).

Modeling Primary Elections – Alexander Kiselgof, Om Lala, and Sasha Ordukhanyan, mentored by Dr. Andy Schultz (Wellesley College) with teaching assistant Gahan Sabir (Wellesley College).

Ballot Length in Single Transferable Voting – Jason Lee, Andy Zhang, and Paige Zhu, mentored by Dr. Kristopher Tapp (Saint Joseph’s University) with teaching assistant Erik Hill (Rice University).

Proportional Representation as Interstate Compacts – Ronit Banga, Eugenia Evangelinos, and Stella Seong, mentored by Dr. Jennifer Wilson (The New School).

The post High School Summer Research Program Final Presentations appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.

We look forward to increasing awareness of IMD’s work and facilitating conversations about the role of mathematics in democracy through the ICM screenings of the video. Watch the video here or find it on the homepage of the IMD website!

The post IMD Video to be Shown at International Congress of Mathematicians appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.

Counted Out features the work of IMD, and this is the first opportunity for everyone to access the movie for free. We hope you will join us for an afternoon of discovery and dialogue.

Saturday, August 8, 1:00 PST/4:00 EST

Free Event, RSVP Required

The post RSVP to Counted Out’s First Free Virtual Screening appeared first on Institute for Mathematics and Democracy.