Competing to the Nth Degree
Mathletes compete on a whole different playing field. Their arena is a classroom, not a field or gymnasium.MATH -COUNTS is a national middle school competitive program that promotes math achievement through a series of fun and engaging contests. Currently in its 27th year, MATH-COUNTS is one of the country’s largest and most successful educational partnerships that has gained positive recognition from President Barack Obama
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Mathletes compete on a whole different playing field. Their arena is a classroom, not a field or gymnasium. Their equipment, basic pencil and paper. And while the atmosphere is more likened to the quiet anticipation of a PGA tournament rather than Super Bowl Sunday’s deafening hoots, the excitement - and stakes - surrounding the MATH-COUNTS competition is just as high.
“As we speak, we’re not going to have enough engineers to take us into the future,” says Enrique Che, manager of customer installations with Hawaiian Electric Company, presenting sponsor of the MATH-COUNTS Oahu Chapter and Hawaii State competitions. “We want - need - more people to go into the sciences and technologies, and get their degrees and their licenses and uphold the standards of the field. What discourages people a lot of the time is the mystery of math.
“But if you get them comfortable with it early on, someone may be inspired and want to go into those subjects. It’s a natural progression to go from math to the sciences.”
MATH-COUNTS is a national middle school competitive program that promotes math achievement through a series of fun and engaging contests. Currently in its 27th year, MATH-COUNTS is one of the country’s largest and most successful educational partnerships that has gained positive recognition from President Barack Obama and former Presidents George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan. The high-stakes national competition and participating mathletes have even been the focus of hour-long ESPN programs.
The 27th annual MATH-COUNTS Oahu Chapter Competition kicks off at 8:30 a.m. Saturday at Kamehameha Schools’ Kalama Dining Hall, where nearly 200 mathletes in grades 6-8 will represent 32 public and private schools as they tackle, wrestle and wrap their minds around problem-solving, analytical and logical thinking. The top teams move on to the Hawaii State Competition at Iolani School March 6, from which winners advance to the national competition May 6-10 in Orlando. The top mathlete to emerge from the Mainland event will earn the title MATH-COUNTS National Champion and the adoration of millions.
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“In middle school mathematics, the MATH-COUNTS chapter competitions are regarded as the pre-Olympic trials,” explains Scott Seu, manager of resource acquisition at HECO and president of the nonprofit Hawaii Society of Professional Engineers (HSPE) Educational Foundation, which organizes the event each year.
“The mathletes are the best and brightest middle school math students, and their participation in this challenge gives them an opportunity to develop their self-confidence while they sharpen their mathematical skills.”
Preparation for the springtime games starts early. Beginning in September, math club coaches lay out a game plan and drill students in algebra, geometry, probability and problems that mimic real-life situations.
“It’s basically problem-solving skills,” says Stevenson Middle School coach Charles Souza. “Kids look for easy ways to solve problems - trying to look at what the problem tells you and try to find the quickest way to solve it. As much as possible we try to make sense of the problems.”
“We practice rigorously,” adds Sung Park, coach of Washington Middle School, which was the first public school team from Hawaii to make it to nationals a few years ago.
“Initially I had to kind of force them, give them food ...” Park continues with a laugh. “Nowadays it’s become a habit. As soon as the school bell rings, they automatically come to my room to practice.”
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On Oahu, the HSPE Educational Foundation has administered both regional and state level MATH-COUNTS competitions since 1984, working with a steering committee of businesses and educators, including Kamehameha Kapalama campus headmaster and MATHCOUNTS chair Dr. Michael Chun.
“This is the type of arena that inspires students to excel in math and to pursue careers in engineering, science, technology and mathematics,” says Chun. “We’re very appreciative of our volunteers and corporate sponsors like Hawaiian Electric Company.”
Other organizations and engineering trade associations to contribute volunteers to MATHCOUNTS include U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, U.S. Coast Guard, University of Hawaii, the Gas Company, ASCE, SAME, Sato & Associates, USACE, Alakai Mech., Austin Tsutsumi, Hawaii Pacific Engineers and participating schools.
“It’s great to see someone or talk to someone that shares with us that this may have been the turning point for them, to inspire them to go into that field,” says Che, who decided to enter the field of engineering during his senior year at Saint Louis. “That’s why I’m in MATHCOUNTS - because I find great gratification in helping others find what they want to do in life.”
Sherilyn Tamagawa is one of those successes to rise from the MATHCOUNTS gauntlet. Tamagawa first entered a “mathletic” competition as a seventh-grader at Kawananakoa. The Roosevelt senior now takes calculus IV at UH and aspires to earn a Ph.D. in math at Harvard or Princeton. She also helps coach the math team at her former intermediate school.
“I really like it (coaching) because they’re (the math-letes) really enthusiastic and they listen to me. And it’s really fun when they figure things out by themselves,” she says. “(But) winning is the funnest part.”
Spoken like a true champion.
For more information about the MATHCOUNTS Oahu Chapter Competition and a full list of participating schools, visit www.eng.hawaii.edu/~hspe/ or call 543-7942.
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