The Mu Alpha Theta team has been practicing for their competitions since the week before school began, building their skills to compete in regional and statewide competitions. After months of preparation and six invitational competitions under their belt, the team attended the State Convention in Orange County April 3 to 6, not only bringing home silver overall, but also several individual award winners from each category.
The team drove to the county by bus April 3, with many students taking the day to further prepare themselves and complete last-minute review for the following days’ tests. The first round, held the next day, consisted of three tests in each students’ respective division: ciphering, individual and topic one. The structure of the state convention differs significantly from that of regional and statewide competitions, adding additional tests not seen at these other levels. For example, topic one in round one is a state-specific competition focused on one topic of math within a student’s category.
Cipherings consist of ten questions, with one additional practice “zero” question at the beginning of the packet, which does not count towards scoring. This test puts heavy focus on speed and accuracy, with students only allowed at maximum three minutes to submit their answer. The quicker they submit, the more points they are rewarded if the response is correct.
Following this, a category-specific—Theta, Alpha, Mu or statistics—individual test was completed. Aside from the increase in difficulty, the structure of these tests remain the same as those from regional and statewide competitions: 30 questions to be completed in 60 minutes. For thetas specifically, the two topics of geometry and algebra II were grouped together into one general “theta individual.”
Based on the results from these two tests, a four-person team was selected from each category to compete in the bowl competition the morning of April 5. After this, round one topic tests began.
The next day began with team rounds, followed by the second round of topic tests. Then, the first half of the awards were presented. Competitors were allowed a break before the second half of individual and overall awards.
Throughout these two days of competition, there were several other state- and national-specific tests that were available to students. These included the Open Gemini, Mental Math, Speed Math, Community Service Project, Poster, Computer Competition, Relay and Hustle tests/events.
American Heritage placed second in state and will attend the Mu Alpha Theta national competition in July. Below is the list of all individuals and teams who placed:
Open Gemini:
Seniors Tiger Ren and Allen Ting – 1st
Mental Math:
Senior Yusuf Sheikh – 2nd
Junior Darsh Patel – 3rd
Speed Math:
Senior Tiger Ren – 1st
Senior Timothy Kong – 5th
Senior Allen Ting – 8th
Alpha Matrices and Vectors:
Freshman Jeffery Xu – 1st
Sophomore Bennet Ortiz – 7th
Sophomore Lance Stus – 10th
Sophomore Ellie Kong – 12th
Mu Limits and Derivatives:
Junior Aaron Alter – 4th
Senior Jack Finneran – 10th
Junior Jason Tang – 13th
Senior Rajam Arunprakash – 16th
Theta Equations and Inequalities:
Freshman Jesse Deng – 4th
Freshman Asher Bernstein – 12th
Freshman Hanfei He – 17th
Freshman Rachel Lagrotte- 18th
Alpha Complex Numbers:
Freshman Kabir Gandhi – 2nd
Sophomore Anthony Rodriguez – 8th
Sophomore Liam Price – 12th
Sophomore Krishang Thakkar – 13th
Sophomore Alexandra Dougherty – 19th
Mu Area and Volume:
Senior Tiger Ren- 4th
Senior Samuil Petrov – 5th
Senior Sai Lalitha Kodukula – 6th
Senior Junsouh Hong – 7th
Theta Geometry:
Freshman Henry Pratt – 15th
Freshman Olivia Chung – 17th
Freshman Christian Azaret – 19th
Alpha Applications:
Freshman Daniel Zhao – 4th
Sophomore Anika Mishra – 9th
Sophomore Julia Diez – 13th
Sophomore Sanvi Pandya – 14th
Sophomore Kyra Mova – 17th
Sophomore Lauren Lee – 18th
Mu BC Calculus:
Senior Yusuf Sheikh- 1st
Senior Guilherme Salles – 2nd
Senior Timothy Kong – 4th
History of Math:
Senior Sihwan Chang – 3rd
Senior Lila Cohen – 4th
Junior Julie Ye – 5th
Senior Apollo Lee – 9th
Junior Henry Nathanson – 13th
Junior Daniel Cai – 16th
Open probability:
Junior Darsh Patel – 2nd
Junior Kaitlyn Lee – 9th
Senior Allen Ting – 12th
Junior Elizabeth Xiao – 13th
Community Service Project:
Freshman Pascal Brinkman, sophomore Kaitlyn Lee and junior Julie Ye – 5th
Poster:
Junior Alina Sukhovskaya – 1st
Computer Competition:
Senior Sai Lalitha Kodukula, senior Junsouh Hong and junior Daniel Cai – 3rd
Relay:
Freshmen Jesse Deng, Jeffery Xu and senior Yusuf Sheikh – 3rd
Hustle:
Junior Kaitlyn Lee, Darsh Patel, freshmen Kabir Gandhi and Daniel Zhao – 2nd
Theta Individual:
Freshman Jesse Deng – 3rd
Freshman Dhruv Ralhan – 7th
Freshman Siddhartha Gupta – 11th
Freshman Hanfei He – 19th
Alpha Individual:
Freshman Jeffery Xu – 3rd
Sophomore Lauren Lee – 8th
Freshman Kabir Gandhi – 9th
Sophomore Sanvi Pandya – 11th
Freshman Daniel Zhao – 23rd
Sophomore Lance Stus – 25th
Statistics Individual:
Junior Kaitlyn Lee – 11th
Junior Aaron Alter – 12th
Junior Elizabeth Xiao – 13th
Junior Daniel Cai – 14th
Junior Jason Tang – 21st
Mu Individual:
Senior Yusuf Sheikh – 2nd
Junior Darsh Patel – 3rd
Senior Junsouh Hong – 7th
Senior Apollo Lee – 8th
Senior Timothy Kong – 9th
Senior Tiger Ren – 10th
Junior Jayden Lang – 11th
Senior Rajam Arunprakash – 18th
Theta Team: Freshmen Jesse Deng, Druv Ralhan, Alexander Alain and Christine Yu – 2nd
Alpha Team: Freshmen Jeffery Xu, Kabir Gandhi and sophomores Anthony Rodriguez, Sanvi Pandya – 2nd
Mu Team: Seniors Yusuf Sheikh, Samuil Petrov, Junsouh Hong, Timothy Kong and junior Darsh Patel – 1st
Stats team: Juniors Elizabeth Xiao, Gabriella Kutcher, Aaron Alter and Jason Tang – 3rd
Ranking second overall at the State Convention, senior members of the Mu Alpha Theta team celebrate their hard work. (Photo/Kyra Mova)
This year’s state team consisted of over 60 students, with the largest category being Mu as it included both the calculus and statistics categories. (Photo/Daniel Ariew)
From left to right, theta freshmen students Rachel Lagrotte, Olivia Chung, Pascal Brinkman, Christian Azaret, Asher Bernstein and Dhruv Ralhan before round two awards. (Photo/Daniel Ariew)
