BROOKINGS – Brookings middle-schoolers Tristina Ting, Samyok Nepal and Serena An will spend a few days in Orlando, Fla., but it’s not for the sake of a vacation, strictly speaking.
Instead, these three Brookings teens will be busily competing with more than 200 students across the country in this year’s Mathcounts nationals competition.
About 25 students from sixth through eighth grade participate in the club at Mickelson Middle School, which teaches students advanced math they don’t see in the classroom at their grade levels and gives them a place to apply their math and problem solving skills.
They start off with practices in October and go through a series of competitions throughout the year, working their way up to nationals. The first hurdle is the school competition, held in Mickelson Middle School eighth-grade math teacher and Mathcounts coach Shannon Renkly’s classroom in December prior to Christmas break. In February, there’s the chapter competition, where the top eight students in the school round compete against other schools in their chapter. Then there’s state (always held in Pierre), and then nationals, which rotates among Boston, Orlando and Washington, D.C. This year, it will be held in Orlando from May 13-16.
Tristina, Samyok and Serena will also be joined by Drew Comstock, of Aberdeen’s Holgate Middle School for nationals, rounding out the four students in the state who have earned the honor.
Samyok got started in Mathcounts after people encouraged him to join. He was always good at math, so he gave it a shot when he entered the sixth grade.
“I didn’t score very well that first year, although better than average. But not good enough to score in the top eight. I decided to work my way to first place the next year,” he said.
Serena, who had exhausted the Common Core curriculum available to her, also started Mathcounts in the sixth grade, while she was still attending school in Maryland, and thought she could handle whatever the program threw her way.
“But the first problem set pretty much crushed that, since I got zero out of three,” she said. But she had others in that club she looked up to, and she kept at it. “I worked really hard that year to try to be as good as them.”
Tristina was also advanced in math. She hadn’t heard of the group before, but she was open to giving it a shot when she was a sixth-grader.
“I made a lot of new friends from this,” she said. “Since then, I’ve also grown in what I’ve learned in math.”
The students are asked to approach problems with a new mindset and apply their skills in ways they weren’t asked to before, and that’s a big hurdle at first. Failure (or at least disappointing results) seems to be a common starting place for those starting out in Mathcounts, something these advanced students are not used to.
“I think it’s one of the hardest things as a sixth-grader coming in. I can see the defeat on their faces in sixth grade, and as much as I say you need to stick with it, I think it’s really hard for some because they are so great at math, and it’s so different. You’re not going to be great at it right away. It takes practice,” Renkly said.
Renkly does what she can to encourage them, though, telling them they will improve as they get more knowledgeable and experienced.
And these students have worked hard honing their skills to get where they are.
With Mathcount, there’s an emphasis on algebra, geometry, counting and probability, and number theory.
“But all of those, even algebra and geometry, go much beyond what we learn in the school system, so we have to put our own time into studying math,” Samyok said.
Serena agreed that the difference between the classroom and Mathcounts is clear. “It’s not use this formula, apply it on the test and forget it one day later. It’s problem solving, which is using what you know to solve a problem you don’t know anything about and haven’t done before. But with past tools and techniques, you can solve problems.”
They use online resources such as Art of Problem Solving to give them an edge, spending hours of their personal time on the site, learning introductory to advanced topics in math at their own pace.
That site is also a fun way to socialize with other students who are passionate about numbers and meet those who they might compete against later.
There’s a lot to look forward to at nationals. They’re thrilled for the good weather, the chance to compete, the chance to watch others compete and to socialize.
When they compete, there is an individual portion and a team portion. There will then be a chance to watch the national countdown round where the top 12 competitors compete in a bracketed buzz-in contest.
“That’ll be interesting, seeing how they can answer the question without the reader even reading the whole question,” Tristina said.
“Sometimes, the reader doesn’t even get a chance to read one word before they buzz in,” Serena added.
On top of all that, they’ll even get brought to the Kennedy Space Center for about half a day.
As for socializing, they get to meet and hang out with the other 200-plus students attending nationals when they arrive at the hotel. There, they can trade lapel pins they all have.
It’s kind of a game for them to try and collect all 56 possible pins (that number includes the 50 states, Washington, D.C., Guam, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, the State Department and the Department of Defense) that’s an easy way to kick-start interactions.
Samyok and Serena, who’ve been to nationals before, said they’ll be making more of an effort to interact and converse with other competitors there.
“It’s just a good idea to not be a hermit and stay in your room the whole time. You’ll have a lot of fun if you go outside and meet other people and just enjoy it,” Serena said.
Although it was a bit intimidating to start coaching Mathcounts five years ago, it’s now one of Renkly’s favorite parts of her job.
“I wish more people in the community were able to see students like this and how they can just succeed past probably anybody’s expectations. I know they’ve exceeded mine. I know all of these kids that are in my Mathcounts club are going to do amazing things some day.”
Contact Eric Sandbulte at esandbulte@brookingsregister.com.
