By Elle Waldron
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| (from front to back) Lila Johnson, Ben Maskell, Alayna Kent, Andrew Dykstra, and Nicole Scheid. |
Math is more than just a class at Northview. Math club offers an opportunity for freshman and sophomore students who enjoy sharpening their math skills, are looking for an extracurricular activity, or simply want to assemble additional experiences for college applications. Coach Andrew Otten, who has been teaching at the high school for two years, says in college he created and ran math competitions, so it was simple to start coaching students to compete in math competitions of their own.
The hard work all adds up for two competitions a year where the club competes with other teams in an all day event. This includes the “Math-Team-Matics” at Grand Valley State University and the “Grand Rapids Community College Math Challenge.”
The competitions involve timed individual tests, relays, and quiz bowl competitions. Relays consist of standing in a line with team members and each person in line answers a question. This answer is passed on and used for the next team member’s question. The quiz bowl was described as similar to the game show Jeopardy.
The team prepares for competitions like these with weekly practices during which they take a look at competition rules and begin searching for loopholes. Next, they practice previous years’ questions and keep up on math homework during the week.
Many freshman math team members join the team because they “just really like doing math” said Andrew Dykstra. Currently only sophomore and freshman students are allowed to compete; competitions for juniors and seniors have simply never been created. Otten and students expressed the hope for an upper class math competition in the future, but for now their focus is on preparing for their next competition March 25.
The hard work all adds up for two competitions a year where the club competes with other teams in an all day event. This includes the “Math-Team-Matics” at Grand Valley State University and the “Grand Rapids Community College Math Challenge.”
The competitions involve timed individual tests, relays, and quiz bowl competitions. Relays consist of standing in a line with team members and each person in line answers a question. This answer is passed on and used for the next team member’s question. The quiz bowl was described as similar to the game show Jeopardy.
The team prepares for competitions like these with weekly practices during which they take a look at competition rules and begin searching for loopholes. Next, they practice previous years’ questions and keep up on math homework during the week.
Many freshman math team members join the team because they “just really like doing math” said Andrew Dykstra. Currently only sophomore and freshman students are allowed to compete; competitions for juniors and seniors have simply never been created. Otten and students expressed the hope for an upper class math competition in the future, but for now their focus is on preparing for their next competition March 25.
Photo Courtesy of Andrew Otten
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