Congratulations and good luck to our students on the All-Star Upstate NY Math Team!

Congratulations to the following Albany Area Math Circle students who have been accepted to the All-Star Upstate New York Math Team for the premier national math competition, ARML, to be held at Penn State next month:
Team veterans Andrew, Dave, Peixuan, Anagha, Schuyler, Matt, and Zubin know that there are many reasons that ARML is awesome and that our rookies have lots to look forward to at ARML, including:



1) Chance to make friends and work hard with outstanding students from all over Upstate NY while riding the bus to Penn State together and talking over the problems between rounds.



2) You can learn a ton of math (and have a ton of fun) in Friday's all-day marathon team practice at Penn State.





3) The great coaching staff includes professional teachers and college student coaches and parent volunteers as well. Albany Area Math Circle alumna Beth Schaffer (left foreground), who is also co-director of the Harvard-MIT Math Tournament, has been a student coach for the Upstate NY ARML team throughout her college years, as has Albany Area Math Circle alumnus Tom Zink, now out in the working world, but still dedicated to the team. Albany Area Math Circle advisor Bill Babbitt and Professor Rita Biswas will also travel with the team to Penn State to assist with coaching and proctoring.

Several of the veteran coaches are full-time active high school math teachers, including head coach Mr. Reuter. Professional math teacher Mrs. Sandy Ohlerich is now retired but still accompanies the Upstate NY team to Penn State each year. That is dedication--and experience--and expertise!

4) A mathematician gives a fascinating math talk on Friday night. In recent years, the speaker has been the awesome saramarie belcastro, above. Her topics have included: Surprising Binary Sequences and Mysterious Expanding Tilings and Matching Up Grids

Here's a poster for the talk Professor belcastro gave last year:



5)Last year's Upstate NY A team miraculously managed to correctly solve the 15-person Super Relay!!!! (and won ARML Frisbees!)

The Upstate NY teams have done consistently well over the years, averaging around 15th place out of 150 teams competing from around the country (and the world!) in recent years. Last year's Upstate NY team beat several teams representing entire states (including Texas!) with populations much larger than Upstate New York!

Good luck to this year's upstate New York team!