Two W.H. residents earn high scores in math competition

On February 5, approximately 30 students from the Waldorf School of Garden City participated in the annual American Mathematics Competitions (AMC) contest. This contest has grown from a single city-wide competition in New York City in 1950, organized by the local section of the Mathematical Association of America, to a sequence of contests given around the country. In 2012, more than 413,000 students from 5,100 U.S. and international schools competed for school, regional and national awards in this contest. The contest, which covers high school mathematics, spurs interest in mathematics and develops talent through the excitement of friendly competition at problem solving in a timed format.

Among the Waldorf students, sophomore Jonathan Gill of West Hempstead won the first-place award in the AMC 10 and junior Rui Zhu, also of West Hempstead, won the first-place award for the AMC 12.

“Zhu was in the top one percent of the national scores,” said High School Math Teacher Michael Gentile.

Gentile went on to say that the real rewards come from challenging each student in math. The problems on the contest are hard, but designed to be within reach. Just by participating in the contest, students feel accomplishment because these problems are meant to be more challenging than routinely encountered in regular math courses.