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Western Province senior team again crowned as winners of the 2017 ASSA Mathematics Team Competition

Wednesday, 13 September 2017

Western Province senior team again crowned as winners of the 2017 ASSA Mathematics Team Competition

On Saturday, the 9th of September 2017 learners from South Africa and neighbouring countries took part in the ASSA South African Maths Team competition organised by the South African Mathematics Foundation (SAMF). Western Province Senior A team and Wits Siyanqoba Junior A team won the competition.

The annual Mathematics Team Competition aims to develop mathematical skills of talented learners who have been identified through the South African Mathematics Olympiad (SAMO) and other SAMF Olympiad programmes.Each team enter two teams of ten: Junior (grades 8 and 9), Senior (grades 10, 11 and 12) and some teams also enter B,C,D, teams at each level. The first part of the Competition is a one-hour individual problem paper, consisting of 15 problems in multiple-choice format. The second paper consists of ten quite difficult problems and now the teams work together and must submit just one set of answers.

A total of 85 teams went head to head in a race to test their mathematical abilities. “For the last number of years the WP Senior A-team usually had a number of IMO/PAMO team members. This year's senior team consisted of 4 International Mathematics Olympiad (IMO) team members, 2 Pan African Mathematical Olympiad (PAMO) team members as well as 3 others who have previously or currently been in SAMO’s top 10. This means they are very experienced,” said Mr Phil Labuschagne, co-organiser of the Western Province teams.

The Team competition is sponsored by the Actuarial Society of South Africa and Casio and provides financial support to all participating provinces including T-shirts, certificates and refreshments for their teams. Mike McDougall, Chief Executive of the Actuarial Society believes in helping learners achieve their academic potential. “The Actuarial Society takes pride in the achievements of the country’s top students through the Maths Team Competition. This strongly compliments our more broad based sponsorship through the Actuarial Education Trust of high school mathematics in disadvantaged areas in collaboration with Paper Video.  We believe that these two initiatives will challenge more students to fulfil their academic potential and we look forward to one day welcoming the most able into the actuarial profession,” he explained.  

The Siyanqoba Regional Olympiad Training Programme organised by SAMF and sponsored by the Department of Science & Technology concentrates on developing problem solving skills. This year 7 Siyanqoba centres participated in the ASSA South African Maths Team Competition, namely Rhodes University, Extra Maths & Science School (Free State), University of Pretoria, Centre of Exellence in Mathematical & Statistical Science (Wits), University of Kwazulu-Natal, University of Limpopo and University of Venda.

 The results are available on http://www.samf.ac.za/assa-team-results

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