Challenge Yourself with Math!

There are many math competitions that take place at our school, for both middle school and high school. Upcoming middle school contests include one tonight: the American Math Contest, and two more: the Purple Comet Team Contest in April and the Waterloo Gauss Contest in May. Upcoming high school contests include the American Math Contest 10 & 12, the Pascal, Cayley & Fermat Contest, the Waterloo Euclid Contest, the Fryer, Galois & Hypatia Contest and the Purple Comet Team Contest.

One, math competition, the Beaver Computing Challenge, took place on November 14. It is run by the University of Waterloo in Canada and is a multiple choice contest focusing on logical and algorithmic thinking. It was the first time that AISG had this contest, and Ms Francis, a math teacher, said,” I was thrilled at how many students showed up. There were many visual questions that were very interesting and they tested different thinking skills.” She added that the competition was online and went from easy to medium to challenging. Ms Francis said, “The challenging questions were cool, and they were all solvable given enough time. However, the test was timed, so people were challenged. Even people who don’t speak English as a first language understood what they needed to do, despite the fact that all the questions were word problems. I really hope that when we do this again next year, more people will show up.” The results of this challenge will be up in about two weeks.

There are many benefits in doing math competitions. One of them is that they look great on your college application letters, especially for the University of Waterloo and University of Canada. Your chances of getting in would increase if you were doing the contests from middle school as it would show your high interest in Math. “Doing these competitions give you something concrete for your applications and demonstrate your interest,” advises Ms Francis. Another benefit is how it is a personal challenge for students that feel like they have a good academic background or have extra classes. They can participate in the contest and see where they stand in the world among thousands of other students from other countries. Ms Francis said, “It is great to see where you rank in the world, especially if you are in the top 5%.” These competitions also allow more kids to be interested in math while enjoying it.

The next math contest, the American Math Contest 10 & 12, is for students from grade 9 to 12 and takes place on February 7. If you are interested, registration starts in early January. See you there!