by Sam Long
Visual description: Cropped preview image of a table and a graph, which are examples of data and materials students will analyze during the lesson.
The spread of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) over the last half-century has entangled science, mathematics, and society in fascinating ways. As an Algebra teacher, I created a case study that challenged students to understand the probabilistic and social aspects of the virus through the eyes of a fictional college student getting his first HIV test.
Students considered the cost of health care, the risk of HIV transmission through different activities, survivorship curves, drug trial recruitment, and diagnostic test sensitivity and specificity. Along the way, students practiced computations with two-way frequency tables, conditional probabilities, permutations and combinations, and financial math. To conclude the case study, students summarized the information provided and made recommendations for the college student's next steps." —SL