The Sixth Annual High School Mathematics Tournament at the University of Iowa was held on Saturday, March 9, 2002 from 9 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. By all counts, it was a great success. The tournament received generous support from a variety of units and individuals; without this support, the event would not have been possible.  I therefore want to begin by thanking those who contributed to its success: The Colleges of Engineering and Liberal Arts; the Departments of Computer Science, Mathematics, Physics and Astronomy, and Statistics and Actuarial Science; and the office of the Provost.  I particularly want to thank Dean Gary Fethke and Professor Carol Fethke, and Mrs. Catharine Wegner, a 1934 Mathematics Alumna and long-time teacher of Mathematics, who helped endow the tournament.  This year’s competition brought together roughly 118 students from the following schools:

 

Cedar Falls High School

Center Point-Urbana

Central High Elkader

City High School, Iowa City

Dubuque Senior High School

Home Schools

Iowa Mennonite

Jefferson High School

Johnston High School

Linn-Mar High School

Mid-Prairie High School

Regina High School

Southeast Polk High School

Tipton High School

West High School, Iowa City

 

The students participated in a total of four "events".  In two of these events (the "Sprint Round" and the "Target Round"), students answered mathematics test questions on individual tests.  In the remaining two events (the "Team Round" and the "Relay Round") students worked in teams. The events were proctored by Professors Oguz Durumeric, Yi Li, Paul Muhly, and seventeen University of Iowa student volunteers.  While the students were writing their exams, a team of Mathematics teachers  from the participating schools graded the completed exams.  Chris Hlas, a Mathematics Education graduate student and Matt Johnson, an undergraduate in Computer Science entered the results into the computer database.  Jaehoon Seol, graduate student and computing assistant, helped with the computers and the collection of test information.  Sandy Stockman, Administrative Assistant, coordinated and organized details of the tournament. 

At the awards ceremony  Alice Fulton, Professor of Biochemistry in the College of Medicine and Director of the Honors Program at the University of Iowa, congratulated the participants and  gave a talk on the importance of the study of mathematics to all students.  She was particularly happy to see the participation of so many high school women and women math teachers in the tournament.  Below is a summary of the results of the tournament.

 

SPRINT ROUND WINNERS (maximum = 120):

 

Grade 9 (large school)  Drew Klein, West High School, Score: 68

Grade 9 (small school)  Philipp Gaebler, Home Schools, Score: 64

Grade 10 (large school) Eric Lee, Linn-Mar High School, Score: 93

Grade 10 (small school) Bill McKenna, Mid-Prairie High School, Score: 60

Grade 11 (large school) John Hegeman,  West High School, Score: 105

Grade 11 (small school) Megan Mathias, Tipton High School, Score: 59

Grade 12 (large school) Alex Power, Cedar Falls High School, Score: 115

Grade 12 (small school) Jeff Miller, Iowa Mennonite, Score: 66

 

TEAM ROUND WINNERS (maximum = 100 for large schools, 50 for small schools)

 

Junior Varsity  (large school) No Team scores

Junior Varsity (small school) Home Schools – Team 01, Score: 30

Varsity (large school)  A tie: Linn-Mar – Team 01 and West High School – Team 03, both with Score: 40

Varsity (small school) A five way tie: Center Point-Urbana – Team 02, Iowa Mennonite – Team 01, Mid-Prairie team 01, Regina High School – Teams 01, 02, all with Score: 10

 

TARGET ROUND WINNERS (maximum = 80)

 

Grade 9 (large school) A four way tie: Sarvesh Anavkar, Linn-Mar; Brett Finger, City High School; Alexander Persaud, Dubuque Senior High School; and Nathan Schulz, City High School, all with Score: 30

Grade 9 (small school) Philipp Gaebler, Home Schools, Score: 30

Grade 10 (large school) Zeb Rocklin, City High School, Score: 40

Grade 10 (small school) Bill McKenna, Mid-Prairie High School, Score: 30

Grade 11 (large school) A tie: John Hegeman and Chengjie Huang, West High School, both with Score: 60

Grade 11 (small school) Michael Rossmann, Regina High School, Score: 20

Grade 12 (large school) Alex Power, Cedar Falls High School, Score: 70

Grade 12 (small school) A three way tie: Jerome Helbert, Center Point-Urbana; Kim Miller, Iowa Mennonite; and Stuart Stutsman, Mid-Prairie, all with Score: 30

 

RELAY ROUND WINNERS (maximum = 100 for large schools, 50 for small schools)

 

Junior Varsity (large school) City High School-Team 08, Score: 20

Junior Varsity (small school) Home Schools-Team 02, Score: 20

Varsity (large school) A five way tie: Cedar Falls High School-Team 01, Linn-Mar Teams- 01, 02 and West High School Teams-09,10, all with Score: 25

Varsity  (small school) Center Point-Urbana-Team 01, Score 20

 

WINNING SCHOOLS-TOTALS OF SCORES (maximum = 400 for large schools, 300 for small schools)

Junior Varsity (large school) City High School, Score: 139.51

Junior Varsity (small school) Home Schools, Score: 132

Varsity (large school) West High School, Score: 219.33

Varsity (small school) Center Point-Urbana, Score: 121

 

At the awards ceremony, Professor Paul Muhly also announced that the twelfth grade winners in the Sprint Round (Jeff Miller, Iowa Mennonite and Alex Power, Cedar Falls High School) and in the Target

Round (Jerome Helbert Center Point-Urbana, Kim Miller Iowa Mennonite, Alex Power Cedar Falls High School, and Stuart Stutsman Mid-Prairie High School) would each receive a prize of $100 from the endowment started by the Fethkes and Mrs. Wegner.

 

               Thanks to everyone who shared in the work of making this tournament run efficiently, and thanks most of all to the students who undertook the nontrivial effort at solving almost three and one half hours of Mathematics problems on Saturday morning.

 

Walter Seaman

Department of Mathematics

University of Iowa

Iowa City, IA 52252

319-335-0795

walter-seaman@uiowa.edu

http://www.math.uiowa.edu/~seaman