For a few delicious, mathematicious hours Tuesday in Lakewood, the pop stars and their fans were more into geometry than Abercrombie, as excited by pi as by iPod.

Hundreds of teens whooped and cheered as they welcomed Zach “Tha’ Duke” Holm, an Emerald Ridge High School senior who made a rap video on all the things you can do with math.

Their jaws dropped as they witnessed math professor and showman Arthur Benjamin spew out the square of two-, three- and four-digit numbers from his head as fast – and as accurately – as a calculator.

“Can I have your autograph?” a wide-eyed eighth-grade girl asked Benjamin in the hall after his appearance.

Numbers heroes, who in another time might have been labeled math geeks, ruled the day at the fourth-annual Math to Careers Conference at Clover Park Technical College. More than 1,200 eighth- and ninth-graders from Bethel, Clover Park, Eatonville and Tacoma school districts converged on the campus to learn why they should care about things like quadratic equations.

“It’s changing the image of math,” said Michaele Sein-Ryan, career counselor and high school transition coordinator at the Tacoma School of the Arts, “that it’s not impossible and that math is cool.”

The half-day event featured talks by dozens of professionals who use math on the job.

A Port of Tacoma representative talked about engineering and demolition of the Asarco tower. Lakewood firefighters illustrated the use of water hydraulics on a fire engine.

Interior designers showed how correctly figuring the amount of fabric for clothing and home accessories affects the bottom line.

Jesse Zumbro, from the Tacoma Rainiers’ marketing department, explained “sabermetrics,” a sophisticated method of calculating an array of baseball player statistics.

“Numbers are everywhere in sports,” Zumbro said. Whether teens are interested in a career in sports or another field, he said, “the best thing you can do is learn Excel.”

Some students love math and earn A’s in the subject. But many share the sentiment of Gault Middle School student Mat Gruber.

“I hate math,” the Tacoma eighth-grader said. “It’s too hard and boring.”

But he appreciated learning about all the careers that use math – and the connection between higher education and higher paychecks.

There were plenty of hands-on activities. Computer science instructors had students shuffle from one area of a room to another to learn how computers work. Thirty students drilled, installed a sink and learned other construction basics to erect an espresso stand.

Cougar Mountain Junior High students Cheyanne Silbernagel, Lacy Jones and Candice Oas were all smiles after building a wooden toolbox.

“Everything in construction is math, from simple fractions to advanced geometry,” said Jim Jones, an instructor at Clover Park Technical.

The ninth-graders from Graham said they were glad they came Tuesday. They seemed aware of the importance of math to their career aspirations. Lacy is considering following her dad into construction. Cheyanne and Candice want to be pediatricians.

“I thought it was pretty cool,” 15-year-old Cheyanne said of the event.

“I’ve always kind of liked math. It just made it seem like it could be even more fun.”

Debby Abe: 253-597-8694

debby.abe@thenewstribune.com">debby.abe@thenewstribune.com

WORD ON THE STREET

To read more about the math conference and get the link to the “Math Is What Ya Do” rap created by Emerald Ridge High School senior Zach Holm, go online to blogs.thenewstribune.com/street.