February proved to be a strong month for Harker LS and MS mathematics, with students performing well in regional competitions, and yet another faculty member receiving honors.
MS math students posted a slew of high scores in the California Math League contest on February 17. The contest consists of 40 problems, with a top score of 40. The league classifies a score of 15 as “commendable” and a score of 30 as “exceptional.”
The Gr. 6 team scored 184 points, with top scorers Angela Gu and Andrew Zhang each earning 39 points. Other high scorers were Cindy Lu and Apoorva Rangan with 36; and Nikhil Kishore, Vivek Sriram and Helen Wu all with 34 points.
Gr. 7 math students shone with a total team score of 194. Top scorers were Vikram Sundar and Albert Zhao, both with a per fect score of 40; Travis Chen and Kristine Lin, both with 39; Albert Chu, Alex Pei, Rahul Sridhar and Nathan Wong, all with 38; Stephanie Chen, Tiffany Chu, Kevin Gao, Ben Huchley and Koshu Takatsuji, all with 37 points. Oishi Banerjee and Nihal Uppugunduri both scored 36 points. Ashwin Chalaka, Nikhil Dilip, Megan Prakash, Claudia Tischler and Andrew Wang each scored 35 points.
The Gr. 8’s team score was 187, with top scorer Ashvin Swaminathan pulling in a per fect score of 40. Tyler Yeats had 38, while Richard Fan had 37. Michael Cheng, Sierra Lincoln and Wilbur Yang each scored 36 points. Connie Cheng, Kyle Roter, Pranav Sharma and Michael Yu had 35 points.
Harker students also had a strong showing at the MathCounts Santa Clara Chapter Competition on Feb. 14. Team competitors were Travis Chen, Sierra Lincoln, Vikram Sundar and Nathan Wong. Competing individually were Rahul Desirazu, Simar Mangat, Pranav Sharma and Wilbur Yang.
Harker was one of 35 schools in the event, which featured a total of 235 highly talented students. As is usual in the Santa Clara chapter, competition was very stiff. Harker placed seventh overall in the event, despite being just 4.5 points behind the first-place school.
At the February tryouts for the Primary Mathematics World Contest, Harker had the highest number of top placers, with five students in Gr. 3-6 earning a top five rank in their respective grades. In the Gr. 6 category, students Cindy Liu and Menghua Rachel Wu took first and fourth place, respectively, while David Zhu took first in the Gr. 4 category, in which classmate Aneesh Samineni took third. Shaya Zarkesh earned first place in the Gr. 3 category.
Also in February, MS math teacher Scott Graham was awarded the Edyth May Sliffe award for 2008 for Distinguished Junior High School Mathematics Teaching.