Sunday, April 4, 2010

Our team sign in progress

How is your team sign for NYSML coming?

Here is Matthew Babbitt with our sign, which is still in progress. (There's an additional design element coming on this side of the sign, and both sides of the sign need to be distinctive and easy for the entire team to spot.)

If your league is sending multiple teams, you don't need to create a sign for each team, because the teams within a given league will be sticking together throughout the day. In other words, their team/power round classrooms will be near one another, they will be seated in the same area of the ballroom and gym, and so on. (But if the multiple teams within your league want to each make their own team signs, they are certain welcome to do so. More chances to win a prize for an outstanding sign!)



UPDATE: Prof Moorthy has created an excellent additional team sign, which you can see below. So now Albany Area Math Circle has two team signs. A third one would be optional but great. Note: as the host team, we will NOT be eligible for team sign awards ourselves.





Prof. Moorthy sign celebrates the fact that this is the tenth year of our Albany Area Math Circle, which started up in 2001 with just eight students, not nearly enough to form even one NYSML team.

One of those original students was Drew Besse, who was a 7th grader during the first year of Albany Area Math Circle in fall 2001. He later became a leader of Math Circle along with co-captain Beth Schaffer in 2005-2007. Drew and Beth are shown celebrating with the Albany Area Math Circle team, which won third place in the A division of 2007 NYSML, held in New York City. (Drew is at top left in the photo. Beth is second from the right in the top row.) Drew and Beth are now alumni, and Beth will be back as a volunteer at this year's NYSML, drawing on her experience as HMMT Tournament Director.

Some of the students in the 2007 picture are still members of this year's AAMC team. In particular, the entire middle row will be veterans on this year's team: Matthew Babbitt, Andrew Ardito, Eric Wang, Dave Bieber, Schuyler Smith, and Felix Sun, as well as Paul Rapoport (center of the back row.) The other students in the photo have all graduated and gone off to college, but Zagreb Mukerjee (front row left) and Yipu Wang (top row second from left) will have younger siblings participating this year. In addition, Eric, Schuyler, and Felix will all be accompanied by one or more younger siblings on this year's math circle teams.

In our first year, we could not even field a full team. This year, we expect to have three teams.

Our community has flourished and thrived across the years, with students building friendships and collaborative relationships that continue long after they have finished high school. It is delightful that many of our alumni return each year for our Memorial Day picnic. We will have one again this year. We look forward to celebrating a very special one in May.

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