Math Counts!
This year’s CEESA Mathcounts competition took place not too far from home at our sister school, the American School of Warsaw. The ISK Hussar Mathletes travelled up to the capital city by train on the 30th January accompanied by their coaches Ewa Panetta and Magda Lasota.
The first Mathcounts rounds took place the next morning when our Mathletes faced up to competition from the American International School of Bucharest, Kyiv International School, Pechersk School International, the American International School of Vilnius, and of course, the American School of Warsaw. The first challenge was the Sprint round – this is an individual round in which competitors have 40 minutes to answer 30 problems without the use of calculators. This was closely followed by the Target round which is also an individual round but this time competitors have four sets of 2 questions and only 6 minutes to answer each set. At least calculators are allowed on this occasion!
After flexing their brains all morning everyone had a chance to socialise and relax over a game of table tennis and then enjoy a scavenger hunt around Warsaw.
As you can see, even the rain could not dampen our spirits. The evening was spent with host families and ISK students were under instructions from their coaches to get a good night’s sleep in preparation for the second day of competition.
Before we got down to problem-solving, however, we began the second day with a trip to the superb Copernicus Science Centre. It doesn’t seem to matter how many times you visit this wonderful museum, you always find something new and exciting to marvel at.
Upon return to our host school, our mathletes divided themselves (well, they are mathematicians, after all!) into their two teams and prepared for the Team round (10 problems to be solved by the team in 20 minutes with the use of calculators).
Well! It gives me immense pleasure to report that out of the 12 teams competing this year, not only did ISK Team A win 2nd place in the Mathcounts 2020 competition (ASW won first place), and not only did ISK Team B finish in 7th place (they are all brand new to this competition!) but ALSO 2 ISK students made it into the Top Ten Individual list of competitors who face the very scary Countdown Round (a one-on-one contest with buzzers, no calculators, a lot of tension, and sudden victory situations!)
Congratulations to ALL the 2020 CEESA Mathcounts ISK Mathletes!!