Kittson Central Mathcounts students take part in regions competition

MATHCOUNTS STUDENTS from Kittson Central attended the regional competition recently. Pictured, l-r, Coach Mark Christenson, Braxton Carr, Hawken Jensen, Addison Johnson and Olivia Kuzel. (Submitted photo)

This year, Mathcounts held a regional in-person competition at Northland Community & Technical College in Thief River Falls on Friday, Feb. 7. The competition is sponsored locally by the Lake Agassiz Chapter of the Minnesota Society of Professional Engineers and Nationally by the National Society of Professional Engineers.
Mathcounts gives students in grades 6-8 an opportunity to sharpen their skills in math. Eight teams competed this year, with 52 students participating.
This year’s teams were Kittson Central, Crookston, Fertile-Beltrami, Bemidji Middle School, St. Phillips in Bemidji, Red Lake Public School and Franklin Middle School of Thief River Falls. Broten Academy and Fowler Academy had homeschool Individuals.
The regional winners go to state competition in Plymouth on Friday, March 7 and 8. The state winners go to the national competition in May.
Trophies were given to teams in small and large school categories. For small schools, Kittson Central was first and Fertile-Beltrami was second. For large schools Crookston was first and Bemidji Middle School was second.
The top 10 individuals also received trophies.
The testing consists of four parts — target, sprint, team and countdown round.
The target round consists of eight problems, which are handed out in pairs and the students are given six minutes to answer each pair.
The sprint round has 30 problems and lasts 40 minutes.
During the team round, teams sit together and are allowed to talk through the 10 problems in 20 minutes.
The countdown round consists of the top 12 individuals. It is not part of the advancement to state or ranking in the chapter and allows parents and coaches to watch and cheer. One question at a time is shown on a screen with two students watching the screen. When a student thinks they know the answer they raise their hand and a volunteer calls on them to give their answer. This year’s winner was Nicolas Licata from Bemidji Middle school and second place went to Owen Shaw from Thief River Falls.
The teams that qualified for state this year are Crookston Middle School, first place; and Bemidji Middle School, second place. The individual that qualified is Elihu Broten from Broten Academy. Wild Card team that had a chance to go to state was Franklin but they didn’t quite make it.
The event was held at Northland Community & Technical College in Thief River Falls. Northland supplied many volunteer scorers and judges, and set up the rooms, provided chairs, tables, and coffee for volunteers, as well as special treat bags for students. The volunteers who ran the tests were from various areas including MnDOR, Northland, Moore Engineering and some retirees. Each year we have a golf tournament in Bemidji to provide funding for the event. The money we make goes to trophies and meals for the MATHCOUNTS students and scholarships at Northland and Bemidji State.