They came. They saw. They conquered math problems.
Nearly 100 public and private high schools from New England participated in WPI’s 26th Annual Invitational Mathematics Meet on Tuesday, Oct. 22. And when the results were in – when all of the sines and cosines were aligned – the Hotchkiss School of Lakeville, Conn., took first place honors.
So what does it feel like to place first in the Math Meet?
“I’m glad that our work paid off,” said Tony Zhang, a junior at Hotchkiss. “The problems were interesting and challenging, and there were elegant facts that we discovered within them.”
Spoken like a true math expert.
Hotchkiss, which placed second in last year’s team competition, said the collaboration was key to their success.
“The most interesting aspect was working with other members on the team round,” said Wendy Yu Xuan Hong, a senior. “We checked each other’s problems and developed strategies to be able to get the problems done. It was a really good collaborating experience.”
Other members of the winning team were seniors Onza Janyaprasert and Emma Yuwei Xu. The winners received $1,000 scholarships to WPI, a plaque commemorating their efforts as well as WPI sweatshirts.
Nearly 400 students participated in the event.
Rounding out the top 10 team winners were Marianapolis Preparatory School in Thompson, Conn., St. Mark’s School of Southborough, Westford Academy, Westborough High School, the Groton School, Northfield Mount Hermon in Gill, Advanced Math & Science Academy of Marlborough, Worcester Academy, and Kent School in Kent, Conn.
- By Andy Baron
