Robert P. Moses, founder of the Algebra Project, Inc. and former civil rights activist, will present a lecture at Hamilton College on Friday, Jan. 31, at 7:00 p.m. The lecture will take place in the Chapel and is free and open to the public.

The Algebra Project, Inc., is a national education program headquartered in Cambridge, Mass. The program, founded by Moses, teaches math literacy to inner city students. It has gained national recognition as educators have noted its positive results in student math-proficiency.

Moses graduated from Hamilton in 1956. He then earned a masters degree from Harvard and taught briefly at the prestigious Horace Mann School in Riverdale, N.Y. In the early 1960's, he went to Atlanta to work with the civil rights movement. He became a prominent leader as a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and was co-director of Mississippi Freedom Summer. He then moved to Tanzania and taught math there for eight years. After returning to the U.S., Moses pursued doctoral studies at Harvard. He taught algebra as a McArthur Fellow which led to the development of the Algebra Project.

Using the strategy of the civil-rights movement, Moses organized the non-profit Algebra Project, Inc. in 1990. He set up local organizations of parents and educators, and within three years over 100 schools were participating in the program. He is now taking the program to schools nationwide, including 31 schools in the Mississippi Delta. "Our mission is to give young people the tool of mathematics and a chance at the good life," he says. "That chance is not meant just for the few, but for everyone."

Moses' honors and awards include an honorary doctorate from Hamilton in 1991.