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“It’s all dancing”: Connecting Through Nature’s Patterns

Meet the Rutgers STEM Mentor, Dr. Shadi Tahvildar-Zadeh!

What does it take to talk to young people about such an abstract concept as high-level math?

Get them to dance, of course!

This was Dr. Shadi Tahvildar-Zadeh’s approach during the STEM Ambassadors Kickoff week last July. As a Rutgers Professor of Mathematics, he has participated in the STEM Ambassadors program as a Rutgers STEM Mentor for the past two years. In this capacity, he has introduced his research fields to over 100 New Jersey Youth from counties as far down south as Atlantic County and as far north as Passaic County.

A large group of young people smiling as they are being led through a dance routine by an older man in the front.
Dr. Tahvildar-Zadeh leads the STEM Ambassadors through a salsa lesson.

In his experience, students often come in and already have a preconceived–often negative–idea of math. Dr. Tahvildar-Zadeh attributes it to how they were taught to learn math: by memorization.

But rote memorization is not how a mathematician thinks about math.

“For someone like me, math is everywhere. I see it everywhere–literally.” Dr. Tahvildar- Zadeh moves through the world seeing the structures and patterns in nature that govern our world. He notices the mathematical patterns in his own dance class–how dancers stand apart at the same distance from one another, move to accommodate other people’s movements, and preserve the dance structure in this system.

This type of collective behavior in nature has a name: emergent behavior. It shows up in groups of birds migrating, stars in a galaxy, and how galaxies interact with each other.

“It’s all dancing,” Dr. Tahvildar-Zadeh explained. And all this dancing is underpinned by a mathematical description.

“If you become aware of that, I’m convinced you gain access to a very powerful tool which you can now use,” he mused. “Because now you realize there are reasons behind things.”

An older man sitting with two young people at a round table. He is listening intently to a person off-screen.
Dr. Tahvildar-Zadeh speaks with interested youth about the realities of being a math researcher.
Let’s Reframe

With this reframing, Dr. Tahvildar-Zadeh set the tone of the roundtable sessions—one of curiosity and fun. This atmosphere made the students more talkative.

Dr. Tahvildar-Zadeh’s strategy at the roundtable was to ask them questions because he was curious about what they were interested in. Many students mentioned sports. Some mentioned medicine and biology. And one talked about his passion for fashion. Dr.Tahvildar-Zadeh saw an opening.

He and the student discussed the science of color. And for the students interested in sports like basketball, they discussed how a physics mindset is innate in players when they shoot the ball.

“My job is to look at the thing that you are interested in and see if I can find my interest in there,” he elaborated.

He knows that one conversation will probably not change a student’s mind about math, even if it is a really great conversation. But, by being given space to express their interests, Dr. Tahvildar-Zadeh hopes they see that this conversation is a two-way street.

“My wife says, ‘you’re like Johnny Appleseed’,” He joked. “You have to plant seeds. And of course, farmers know not every seed that you plant grows to become a tree. But if you want trees, you still have to plant.”

He likes to think that the seed is there. Even if they might not realize it’s there, sometime in the future they might remember.

With this experience, Dr. Tahvildar-Zadeh had a chance to stretch his own communication skills. Meeting the students where they are at, at their interests, is a skill he takes back to his mentorship with undergraduate and graduate students.