Data projects for charities · Maths CAS idea
Water or air quality data for an environmental group
ServiceProject-ready
Join a local environmental group's monitoring work and help analyse and present the measurements they collect.
Where the maths comes in
Measurement error, averages over time, trends and graphs that a council or public will understand.
Which CAS strand it fits
- Service: Unpaid, voluntary work with others that also has a learning benefit for you.
Your CAS coordinator decides how an experience counts at your school. Strand summaries are provisional (our words, being checked).
How to run it
- Contact a group that already monitors local water or air.
- Learn their measurement method and help collect data if safe.
- Analyse and present trends with honest uncertainty.
- Help them share findings with the community.
This can grow into a CAS project if your CAS coordinator agrees: see planning a maths CAS project.
How to evidence it
- Training and fieldwork log
- Analysis and charts
- Group's response
Date everything and keep it in your school's CAS portfolio as you go. More on what counts as evidence.
Reflection prompts
Questions to think about, not answers to copy. Write your reflections in your own words, in whatever form your school accepts.
- What did you learn about the quality of the measurements?
- How does this local data connect to a wider environmental issue?
- What did you do to make the results understandable to the public?
Learning outcomes this often gives a chance to show
- Global significance. How does the local need you worked on connect to a wider issue? What did you learn about that issue that you did not know before?
- Commitment and perseverance. When did you feel like stopping, and what kept you going? What does your record of sessions or meetings show about how regularly you took part?
- Collaboration. What did someone else bring that you could not have done alone? Describe a disagreement or a mix-up in the team. How was it resolved?
Whether you meet an outcome depends on what you actually do and reflect on, not on the idea. Outcome labels are our short summaries, being checked.
Safety and ethics
- Fieldwork near water or roads needs the group's risk assessment and supervision.
- Follow the group's rules on publishing data.
Agree every plan with your CAS coordinator first. Safety and ethics for maths CAS.
Need the statistics? The statistics guide (written for the IA) explains tests and charts step by step. Keep CAS and your IA separate.