A major achievement of Soviet mathematics education is the extensive program of extracurricular activities designed to discover and train future mathematicians and scientists at an early age. In recent years this program has taken on new dimensions. The world-renowned mathematician, I. M. Gelfand, organized in 1963 the Mathematics Correspondence School at Moscow State University. An indication of the scope of the MCS is the admission in 1966 of 1000 ninth-grade pupils as correspondence students on the basis of highly competitive examinations. The MCS has also established a special program in which 250 mathematics clubs from all over the country participate as “collective students.”
As a result of the activities of the MCS, a series of books in mathematics is currently appearing under the title Library of the Physics-Mathematics School, with Professor Gelfand as the editor. The booklets are designed to give the reader a deeper understanding of mathematics, to acquaint him with new ideas and methods, and to develop in him habits of independent work. These publications contain an abundance of ingenious problems along with solutions, answers, and hints. Solving these imaginative problems often requires thorough analysis and concentrated effort conductive to mathematical creativity.
These American editions have been prepared by the Survey of Recent East European mathematical Literature at the University of Chicago under a grant from the National Science Foundation. They should prove to be of great value to mathematics teachers, to college students, and to high school students interested in independent study or mathematics group activities.
