by Dennis Dalman
editor@thenewsleaders.com
Many Sartell students as teams and individuals excelled at the Math Contest held recently at St. Cloud State University, which has been an annual event since 1968.
One of the major winners was Nate Pfeiffer, a Sartell senior, who won a $400 SCSU scholarship because of his superb performance on the testing. He plans to attend SCSU in fall 2015.
Led by the SCSU mathematics and statistics department, the contest invites those in the top 15 percent in each school district to compete. The contest then recognizes those who make the top 20, 10 and 5 percent of those competing at each grade level.
Each grade level was honored with first-, second- and third-place team awards, as well as first-, second- and third-place individual awards.
About 2,000 students in grades 7-12 participated in the contest.
“This is a hallmark tradition of the mathematics and statistics department,” said Dale Buske, math professor and former contestant in the SCSU math contest (1982-83). “Community outreach has been a significant part of our work for much of our history . . . We recognize the need to serve as leaders in mathematics education in central Minnesota. The recognition builds confidence in ability and often a desire to pursue further study in mathematics or related disciplines.”
The tests are written and graded by SCSU faculty, staff and students.
Besides the scholarship-winning Pfeiffer, the other Sartell students who placed in the contest are the following:
Individual winners Grade 7: Janagan Ramanathan, second place; and David Zhang, second place.
First-place team winners Grade 7: Ramanthan, Jacob Wieland and Zhang.
Individual winners Grade 8: Mohannad Alkhatib, second place; Mack Sathre, third place; Alissa Teigland, third place; and Cindy Zhang, third place.
First-place team winners Grad 8: Alkhatib, Sathre, Teigland and Zhang.
A vast roomful of brains toil at math problems during the annual Math Contest at St. Cloud State University.