Mars Area High School juniors Lauren Miko and Luke Weiland qualified as semifinalists in The Actuarial Foundation’s Modeling the Future Challenge.

The national competition asks teams of high school students to conduct an actuarial research project through which they make recommendations to companies, organizations, government agencies or other groups, based on their own mathematical models, real-world data analysis, and risk management. The challenge focuses on students’ critical-thinking, mathematical-reasoning, and analytical skills.  

In the first phase, teams are given a scenario description, data-set, and a series of questions that evaluate the students’ expertise in statistics and probability fundamentals; projecting trends; modeling data; analyzing risks; and making critical thinking recommendations. Teams that pass the first phase are recognized as semifinalists and advance to the second phase, during which they will conduct their own actuarial research project. 

Teams selected as finalists will prepare a live presentation for the Modeling the Future Challenge Symposium, at which they will compete for various scholarship awards. For more information, visit https://www.mtfchallenge.org/.