MathCounts
MathCounts is a middle school math competition held in the United States. Its founding sponsors include the CNA Foundation, National Society of Professional Engineers, and the single elimination bracket. The top 12 scorers on the written round advance to the Countdown Round. In the first round, 5th place plays 12th place, 6th place plays 11th place, etc., and the top 4 places receive a first-round bye. This change was presumably made in hopes of making this final round more exciting and more suspenseful, since now the champion must win three consecutive matches, as opposed to previous years when a student could potentially win the championship after defeating a single opponent.
Forty-five seconds are allotted per problem. However, the problem will only be scored by the first participant to correctly answer it, and therefore it is essential for participants to work quickly.
For the earlier rounds, each match consists of three problems; if there is a tie (1-1 or 0-0) further problems are used to resolve it. In later rounds, the match ends when either contestant scores 3 problems.
At the state and chapter levels, the Countdown Round may or may not be held. If it is held, it may or may not be official; some chapter and state competitions choose to hold a countdown round as a separate competition that does not affect the final rankings of competitors.
Masters Round
At the national level, there is an additional round known as the Masters Round, open only to the top four contestants. Participants are given a limited amount of time to develop a presentation based upon an advanced mathematical topic, not known to them until immediately before their presentations. While an award is given for the best presentation, the Masters Round does not affect participants' rankings.
Subject matter
Mathcounts is a contest designed for 6th, 7th and 8th graders, especially for 8th graders. Therefore, the mathematical subject matter of the contest does not contain mathematical topics beyond geometry. For example, complex numbers, calculus, and trigonometric identities are not featured in the contest. Instead, the contest places an emphasis on advanced problem solving skill within traditional middle-school mathematics.
Scoring
Individual score
Each contestant's individual score is his or her Sprint Round score (out of 30) plus twice his or her Target Round score (out of 8), so that a perfect score is 46. Many years, perfect scores do not occur. For example, in the 1996 National competition, the highest score was a 38, and a score of 33 sufficed to enter the Countdown Round.
Team score
A team's score is the average of its participants' individual scores (if the team does not have four members, scores of zero are added in) plus twice the number of questions it answered correctly on the team round. A perfect team score is 46.0 + (2 * 10) = 66.0.
Timeline
Most schools begin preparing for the MathCounts competition in September or October. The team is often selected via an optional school-level competition provided by MathCounts.
The local-level competitions (officially called the "Chapter" competitions) occur throughout the month of February, and the state-levels occur in March. The national contest -- a prestigious four-day event -- occurs in May. The actual contest occurs on the second day of the event, which is usually a Friday.
In 2004, the National Mathcounts competition was held in Washington, D.C. between May 6 and May 9, but the actual contest was on May 7.
In 2002 and 2003 the national competition was held in Chicago, Illinois, while prior to 2002 every national competition was held in Washington, D.C. The competition is now set to alternate between Washington and Chicago every two years.
States that tend to do well in MathCounts
National Champions
- Michael Edwards, 1984
- Timothy Kokesh, 1985
- Brian David Ewald, 1986
- Russell Mann, 1987
- Andrew Shultz, 1988
- Albert Kurz, 1989
- Brian Jenkins, 1990
- Jonathan L. Weinstein, 1991
- Andrei C. Gnepp, 1992
- Charleton Bosley, 1993
- William O. Engel, 1994
- Richard Reifsnyder, 1995
- Alexander Schwartz, 1996
- Zhihao Liu, 1997
- Ricky Liu, 1998
- Po-Ru Loh, 1999
- Ruozhou Jia, 2000
- Ryan Ko, 2001
- Albert Ni, 2002
- Adam Hesterberg, 2003
- Gregory Gauthier, 2004
Results of the 2004 MathCounts National Competition
The champion was Gregory Gauthier, from Wheaton, Illinois. Jeffrey Chen of College Station, Texas finished second. On May 18, 2004, the 2004 national champions made a visit to the White House.
History
MathCounts started in 1984. Since then, many schools registered to this program. As of March 18, 2004, 6093 schools have been registered.
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