LA PLATA, Md. (Feb. 8, 2016)—A team from Milton M. Somers Middle School advances to the state MathCounts event after finishing in second place overall among 21 competing teams at the Southern Maryland competition held Feb. 4 at Calvert Middle School. The top five competing teams advance to the state MathCounts competition, which will be held later this spring. Middle school teams from Calvert, Charles and St. Mary's counties competed in the regional competition.
Members of the Somers team are seventh graders Jack Glassman, Erin Possehl and Emily Smith, and eighth grader Brandon Luton. The team coach is Jennifer Rowland, math teacher at Somers. This is the fourth consecutive year that a team from Somers advanced to the state level.
Smith earned first place among competing students in the individual rankings. Piccowaxen Middle School eighth grader Jake Burgess also advances to the state-level tournament based on his individual performance. The competition consists of four rounds in which students compete and earn points both as team members and individuals.
In the sprint round, students individually complete a 30-question test. In the target round, students have four sets of math problems and are given six minutes to complete each set of two questions. During the team round, students receive 20 minutes to complete 10 questions as a team. The final round is a Jeopardy-style countdown round in which the top 12 students compete against each other.
MathCounts is one of the country's largest and most successful education partnerships involving volunteers, educators, industry sponsors and students. The regional competition is sponsored by the three Southern Maryland public school systems, Southern Maryland Electric Cooperative, Inc., and the National Society of Professional Engineers. For more information about MathCounts, visit https://www.mathcounts.org/.