Gov. Racicot learns to ‘walk the walk’ from math students

By Aaron Engebretson

On Jan. 22, Karen Longhart’s math students got to show Gov. Marc Racicot they could not only talk math — they also could walk math. And they challenged the governor to do the same.

“It was great of him to get involved in what we were doing,” said junior Tim Wood, who helped make a presentation using CBL motion sensors. “For a first-timer with an easy graph, he performed excellently.”

Racicot was in Kalispell for the Laser graduation and later visited Karen Longhart’s math classes for 45 minutes. Longhart, the president of the Montana Council of Teachers of Math, had written to the governor three times over the past two years inviting him to her classes.

“It was good to show the leader of our state what we are doing,” said junior Dane Dach.

Racicot participated in a graphing game coached by math IV students seniors Jose Bustamante and Tom Lenz. The governor was given a graph relating time and distance. He was then asked to provide the data necessary to draw the graph by moving toward a motion censor connected to the TI-83.

“The students capabilities to work with the technology, and their confidence with it, was encouraging,” said the governor.

The first presentation made to Racicot included three cardboard houses built by sophomores Chris Fredericks, Dustin DeYong and junior Dane Dach. The houses were selected because of their uniqueness and built as part of a project to find the total volume and cost of the house.

“(Longhart) liked mine because it had big windows and angles,” said Fredricks. “I was impressed (Racicot) could make conversation over a box.”

The governor was then told about the rising costs of Super Bowl commercials by juniors Andrew Tressel and Blake Thompson. The pair used the statistical functions of the TI-83 to predict the cost of this year’s commercials.

Finally, juniors David Van and Susan Wenger gave a presentation on how to find the maximum volume from a piece of paper folded into a box. Van gave the presentation and Wenger helped the governor through the problem.

“It was hard to keep up” with Van, said Wenger. “He was going really fast and I didn’t have all the information on my calculator.”

Racicot said he tries to get out to see as many classes as possible.

“Education is important to the workings of government,” said Racicot. “Students need to know and understand how the world works so they can make responsible leaders.

“I enjoy going to schools and seeing that (students) are so bright and hard working, and possess technological understanding.”