| Contact: | Prof. Steve R. Dunbar |
| MAA American Mathematics Competitions Director | |
| 402-472-6206 | |
| sdunbar@maa.org | |
| Contact: | (Local School Official) |
| (Your School's Name) | |
| (Your City, State) | |
| (Your School's Contact person's Phone) | |
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PRESS RELEASE — FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Mathematical Association of America Announces
Participants for 2008 USA Mathematical Olympiads
Lincoln NE. - April, 2008 - The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) has announced the names of 503 brilliant high school students who qualified for the extremely selective 2008 USA Mathematical Olympiad (USAMO). Among those students is (student name) at (school) in (city, state). The 2-day, 6 question USAMO will be distributed via the Internet on April 29-30 to the participant's schools across the nation. Students will take the mathematical proof-writing USAMO contest in school under the supervision of a teacher. Student's test papers are faxed to the American Mathematics Competitions office for grading by a panel of professional mathematicians. Twelve top scoring student will be announced as winners of the USAMO Monday, May 12, 2008. An awards ceremony for the 12 USAMO Winners will be held June 8-9, in Washington DC at the MAA Headquarters and the U.S. Department of State Building.
The USAMO is the pinnacle event in the sequence of increasingly challenging mathematical contests administered annually by the MAA American Mathematics Competitions program. The MAA's American Mathematics Competitions seeks to encourage student interest and achievement in mathematics through these challenging mathematical contests. Over 225,000 students worldwide took the first contest (AMC 10 and/or AMC 12). This number is normally reduced to around 10,000 students who are invited to participate in the second contest ( the American Invitational Mathematics Examination - AIME). This year only 503 were selected from the AIME (second contest) to participate in the highly selective and prestigious USAMO.
"The students invited for the USA Mathematical Olympiad demonstrate exceptional mathematical ability and deserve to be recognized for this outstanding achievement" said Steven R. Dunbar, Professor of Mathematics (University of Nebraska - Lincoln), and Director of the American Mathematics Competitions program for the MAA "It's the MAA's honor to provide a challenging opportunity to these exceptionally brilliant students taking the USAMO. Mathematical competitions not only induce the drive and determination necessary in successfully completing each exam, but also serve as the stimulus to pushing their education to the highest possible levels."
"We are delighted that more than 225,000 mathematically-accomplished young men and women chose to compete for the invitation to take this challenging contest. These students spent hours in preparation for these exams and are already among the nation's best," said Steve Dunbar. "We are grateful to the MAA and all our contributors for their tremendous support and efforts in raising awareness about the importance of mathematics."
"We're also thankful to the 23 professional associations and companies who are instrumental in making the competitions a success. This broad-based support of the mathematical sciences community has contributed greatly to the success of the MAA American Mathematics Competitions."
The students invited to compete represent the top scorers in all 50 States, the District of Columbia, US territories and abroad on the prior AMC 10, AMC 12 competitions in February 2008 and the American Invitational Mathematics Exam in March/April 2008. The students are in grades 6-12 and have qualified for the invitation by outscoring other students nationally on both prior contests.
About the MAA:
The Mathematical Association of America is the largest professional society of college and university mathematics teachers in the world. Today MAA's 25,000 members include two- and four-year college, university and graduate school faculty, high school teachers, government and corporate workers, research mathematicians, as well as graduate and undergraduate students. For more information about the MAA, see http://www.maa.org
For more information about MAA's American Mathematics Competitions visit us at http://www.unl.edu/amc/
For a complete list of students invited to the USAMO, see:
http://www.unl.edu/amc/e-exams/e8-usamo/e8-1-usamoarchive/2008-ua/2008usamoqual.shtml
