Liberty’s Math Club won the Math is Cool, Masters Competition on December 4 at Moses Lake High School.
The team of junior President Dhaman Kaur, junior Jyotsna Kuramkote, sophomore Felicia Yan, senior Alex Le and math club advisor Angie Kruzich won its first competition.
The competition consists of mental math problems in test form.
No calculators are allowed in the Master’s area of competition. Each competitor takes six tests total, some individual and some with a group.
“They have gotten close before,” Kruzich said. “But this is the first time they have actually won first place. I could not be prouder of them.”
In order to prepare for competition, the club did practice problems from past competitions, for more exposure to the competition format.
“Practice problems, practice problems, practice problems! That is the only way to get better, quicker and more accurate with your math,” Kruzich said.
For winning the competition, a plaque was awarded to the team. The stone plaque will be exhibited in the display case in the commons along with other awards Liberty students have won.
“Since we took third place at the Regional competition, I was not expecting to place above that. When the announcers started counting down, we were not expected to be called; when they announced Liberty as first place, we were all looking at each other in shock, and we could not believe it,” Kaur said.
Since the team won the state competition, they are considering an AMC math competition, and will be working on independent projects.
The details of the projects are still to be determined, but it is meant to further broaden the math skills of the club members.
However, the team is already planning ahead for further success next year since the winning team was predominately juniors.
“We are looking forward to next year’s State competition, and trying to hold our title. Alex is pretty good, so we will miss having him apart of the team next year,” Kaur said.