PROBLEM SOLVING SEMINAR - SPRING 2008

Moderator

Dan-Andrei Geba

Seminars

TH 5:00-6:00pm (every other week), 1101 Hylan Building

E-mail

dangebamath

Goals of the seminar

This semester, in order to better prepare for future math contests and also to acquire new mathematical knowledge, our seminar will look more like an workshop. We will take a look at previous undergraduate competitions (e.g. Putnam, Virginia Tech, ICM etc.). The emphasis will be on students to find as many different solutions as possible for a problem (potentially generalizing them to wider contexts) and to present them in a clear and concise manner to their colleagues. The hope is that our seminar will serve both as a possible source of ideas for undergraduate research projects and as a helpful guide for prospective and current graduate students preparing for the GRE Subject exam or the Ph.D. preliminary exam.

The highlight of this semester was the

2nd University of Rochester Math Olympiad

It took place on Saturday, March 29, 9-12am. This year a total of 48 students from 7 colleges (Cornell, RIT, Nazareth, Saint John Fisher, SUNY Brockport, SUNY Geneseo and Rochester) in Western New York took the exam. The exam contained 4 proof-based problems to be solved in a span of 3 hours. We are looking to increase the field of participants next year by inviting other New York colleges. Here are the top 5 results of this exam:
Rank Name College Score Award
1-2 Cheng Sun Rochester 40 First prize
1-2 Seth Weinberg Cornell 40 First prize
3 Zheng Kang Tham Cornell 35 Third prize
4-5 Christopher Kauffman Rochester 33 Distinguished performance
4-5 Wei Quan Julius Poh Cornell 33 Distinguished performance

Three other UR students obtained also very good results: Michael Wijaya (distinguished performance), Zachary De Santis and Jordan Paschke (both earned honorable mentions).

Results of our students in math competitions

We participated with a team of 16 students in the Virginia Tech Regional Mathematics Contest . There were a total of 397 students from 67 colleges (among them: Princeton, Duke, Purdue, Carnegie Mellon, Johns Hopkins, North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Michigan, Virginia) participating this year. Our Putnam team formed by Cheng Sun, Chris Kauffman and Michael Wijaya, had a great performance: Cheng was ranked 9th with 50 points, Chris placed 51st, while Michael was in the 81st position. Also, Li Li, Ryan McMichael and Raisa Trubko had distinguished performances in this contest.

This year a total of 3753 students from 516 colleges in North America participated in the prestigious William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition , with 413 teams officially registered. Our team composed of Cheng Sun, Michael Wijaya and Chris Kauffman, had a great result, being ranked 32nd overall (up 29 places from last year's rank of 61). Also, Cheng was ranked 113th individually, while Michael and Chris placed in the top 700. Two other UR students, Greg Wilbur and Dennis Huo, had distinguished performances. A total of 24 Rochester students competed in the contest.

Schedule of seminars


Date Lecture Presenters
1/17 Putnam 2006: Problems & solutions Gordon(A1), Stelzig(A2), King(A3), Kauffman(A4), Christopher(A5), Huo(A6)
1/31 Putnam 2006: Problems & solutions Trubko(B1), Corwin(B2), Varol(B3), St-Juste(B4), Sun(B5), Haremza(B6)
2/14 Putnam 2005: Problems & solutions St-Juste(A1-A6)
2/28 Putnam 2005: Problems & solutions Wijaya(B1-B6)
3/20 U. of R. Math Olympiad review Dan Geba
3/29 2nd U. of R. Math Olympiad 8:45-12:00pm, Hylan 1106A
4/10 U. of R. contest aftermath Dan Geba

College Mathematics Competitions

The William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition

Virginia Tech Regional Mathematics Contest

IMC-International Mathematics Competition for University Students

Resources

Collection of math problems organized by John Scholes

The MathLinks Forum organized by Valentin Vornicu

Problem Seminar webpage created by Jun-Ping Shi at College of William and Mary