School contests are typically loud affairs, with air horns and cheering sections and raucous spectators. But the first couple of rounds of the St. Croix MATHCOUNTS competition Friday were remarkably silent.
The big winner of the annual competition — a national math enrichment program for middle schools — was Country Day School with the top team and top individuals. Tackling algebra, probability, statistics and geometry were 80 public and private school students from 11 elementary and junior high schools.
Competitors took part in four rounds of different types of math competition in the Good Hope School gymnasium before their fellow students, parents, teachers and coaches. The student competitors, all in royal blue MATHCOUNTS T-shirts, were seated randomly with four to seven students at 13 tables.
The Sprint Round was first with 30 problems done individually on scratch paper only, no calculators, in 40 minutes and then tested for accuracy. Round two was a Target Round lasting 30 minutes. This round consisted of eight problems presented to each individual. It featured multi-step problems that engaged students in mathematical reasoning and problem solving with the use of a calculator.
The Team Round was next. It consisted of 10 problems solved by team members working together with calculators. The fourth round was the Count Down Round. This round was a fast paced oral competition for the top scoring individuals based on scores from previous rounds. Pairs of students without calculators competed against each other doing timed problems.
“It is very challenging competition,” said Patricia Piper, an eighth grader at Elena Christian. “It was a little frustrating but we gave it our best.”
First place in team competition went to Country Day School and second place went to Good Hope School. Third place was awarded to Elena L. Christian Jr. High and in fourth was John H. Woodson Jr. High. The top individual scorers were Chris Carr in first place and Hannah Coughlin in second place, both from Country Day. Raheem Knight, a seventh grader at Elana Christian, came in third and Eve Waterson of Country Day was fourth. Overall champion was Coughlin. The students in the top six positions were awarded trophies and all participants got certificates.
Juanita Boneque, Department of Education district math coordinator and organizer of the competition, said the student "mathletes" trained with specially prepared coaching materials that were provided free-of-charge to all middle schools across the country.
“MATHCOUNTS is to encourage students to excel and compete academically in math,” Boneque said. “They need to excel in math to be prepared for careers in engineering, medicine, science and more.” Zoraida Jacobs, DOE reading campaign coordinator, said the competition is also an excellent opportunity to showcase the importance of reading, as she handed out test booklets that had story problems.
The top team and four top individual mathletes will advance to the State MATHCOUNTS competition slated for March 25 on St. Croix. The national competition will be in Orlando, Fla. in May. Local sponsors were the St. Croix Rotary Club Midisle and Department of Education.
Students competing were from Elena L. Christian and John H. Woodson Junior High Schools; Claude O. Markoe, Pearl B. Larsen, Ricardo Richards, Lew Muckle and Eulalie Rivera Elementary Schools; Good Hope, St. Croix Country Day, Church of God Holiness Academy and the Manor Schools.
