Heritage’s national math team, composed of 52 mathletes, traveled to Las Vegas July 6-12 to compete against 25 other schools for the title of national champion.
Remaining the #1 private school in the nation and second overall, the math team experienced record-breaking success.
Senior Yusuf Sheikh swept the competition winning all first places, while sophomore Shreyas Baghel placed first in Chalk Talk, a mathematical presentation-based competition. Additionally, student artists secured the first-ever national win in the poster category.
“My experience this year at nationals can be summed up in a single word: amazing. An amazing performance netted me a first place trophy and a contribution towards Sweepstakes for my team,” Baghel said.
The math team placed in the top three for all non-individual math competition categories except for the interschool test, which involves a team of 12 students competing over the course of two hours to solve puzzle-based math problems.
Mu (the team’s Calculus and Statistics divisions), Alpha ( Precalculus division) and Theta (Algebra and Geometry division) all placed second overall.
For this convention, students were required to take an individual test, a ciphering test and three topic tests. The individual test was a one hour 30-question test dealing with all topics of a specific field of math (Algebra and Geometry, Precalculus or Calculus and Statistics). The ciphering test was a 36-minute 12-question test in which students were given three minutes to solve each problem. The topic test was a one hour 30-question test chosen by the student that targets a specific topic in the division they are taking. The full list of all placings can be found here.
In other news, students enjoyed connecting with people who had similar interests. The convention opened with a mixer in which students from different schools were given a chance to meet each other through solving puzzles together. Founder of Art of Problem Solving, a math competition education organization, Richard Rusczyk was the keynote speaker.
Closing the national convention, the team’s rising seniors gave speeches and gifts to the graduated students. The new alumni then gave their final speeches to sum up their high school math competition careers.
With over 139 placings in individual events, this season is concluded by the Heritage seniors (front row) giving speeches. “For us seniors, it’s sad that we can’t be a part of this program forever, but I can assure you that you guys are in great hands. I’m very excited for what the future holds for all of you,” alumnus Aaron Zhang (front row, far right) said in his senior speech. With this farewell, the new presidents, seniors Rajam Arunprakash, Yusuf Sheikh and Jack Finneran lead the new chapter. (Photo/Alina Sukhovskaya)
