More than 600 miles from the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science lies the North Carolina School of Sciences and Mathematics. MSMS’s sister school is located in Durham and has been around since 1980, just seven years before the establishment of MSMS. It has been announced recently that 11 students from NCSSM will come to visit the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science.

Deldrick Adams, a MSMS emissary and the Class of 2016 President stated, “I don’t know much about the students visit, but I hope this will be an opportunity to learn from each other.”

NCSSM is also only available to 11th and 12 grade students, and the similarities do not stop there. MSMS and NCSSM both have blue in their school colors and also marine-themed mascots; NCSSM’s mascot is the Unicorn nicknamed Unis, Narwhals (swim) and MSMS’s mascot is the Blue Waves.

MSMS emissary Summar McGee said, “I hope to have a great experience with the 11 NCSSM students. I think this experience will be a great bridge-builder between us”

Not much is known about this intellectual excursion; however, rumors are circulating that the trip will be an overnighter. Some students said the school’s visitors will be sharing rooms with MSMS emissaries; others say they will be staying on the first floors of MSMS’s dorms.

Although there are many similarities between MSMS and NCSSM, there are also many differences noted by students. The largest one happens to be the two schools’ enrollment. NCSSM  has more than 650 students, while MSMS has almost a third of that.

Laurel Lancaster, also a MSMS emissary, mentioned, “I’m very excited about the students from North Carolina visiting. It will be interesting to see the difference between the two schools.”