Math Zoom received the AMC 8 result back from AMC on Friday. The award-winning cut-off points proved that this year's problems are harder than before. The Distinction Award (top 1%) cutoff point is 20, comparing to 22 last year. The Honor Roll Award (top 5%) cutoff point is 17, comparing to 19 last year. The Merit Award (6 grade and below) cutoff point is raised to 15 points though, comparing to 14 last year. This may be a good indicator that the participants are getting younger. According to an incomplete survey, 27 awards are received by Math Zoom students so far.

Math Zoom Academy presented the final extravaganza of the Southern California Math Olympiad 2009 on December 6, 2009 at Sage Hill High School in Newport Beach. For more info about SCMO, click here. The event started with a talk given by Math Professor Dr. Hongkai Zhao from UCI. Afterwards, Ms. Kelly Ren showed some interesting pictures taken at the major math contest events. The high energy Team Challenge started at 2:45PM, and lasted for one hour. Contestants selected from the written round held in October are assigned into 4 teams Red, Yellow, Blue and Green. The Grand Challenge started at around 4:00PM, while the first presenter started to work on the problems as early as half an hour before that. The judge panel of the Grand Round: Dr. Kevin Wang, Academic Director at Math Zoom Academy; Dr. Hongkai Zhao, Math Professor at UCI; Dr. Mihaela Vajiac, Math Professor at Chapman University; Mr. Noureddine Alam, Math Department Chair at Sage Hill High School.

Here is the result of the SCMO Final Rounds:

• SCMO Grand Challenge:

1st place winner: George Xing, 12th Grade, Irvine.

2nd place winners: Kevin Yin, 10th Grade, San Marino. David Yang, 9th Grade, Diamond Bar.

• SCMO Team Challenge.

1st place winner: Red Team: Lisa Beckmann, Aaron Cheng, Daniel Suryakusuma, Matthew Voss, Dai Yang, Leon Zhou, Guanyang Yu, Vinson Luo.

2nd place winner: Blue Team: David Ding, Jasper Lee, Benjamin Lin, Henry Maltby, Patrick Manalo, Leon Yao, Leon Zhang, Edward Kim

3rd place winner: Green Team: Bryan Brzycki, Bryan Kam, Hyun Jong Kim, Michelle Li, Raku Watari, Simon Wu, Nolan Wagener, Aritro Biswas, Robert Wu

4th place winner: Yellow Team: Sarah Herrmann, Patrick Lee, Christopher Miro, Roger Sheu, Kyle Sitton, Tony Wang, Patrick Xiao, Evelyn Chao

Time flies. Three weeks passed by so quickly. All campers departured yesterday, taking home the big smiles, best memories of three weeks' fun Math, and experiences. Here are some of the comments from the campers and their parents.

"Math Zoom is a great camp. I learned a lot and had a lot of fun!"

"It's not just three weeks of Math, it's fun Math."

"Math Zoom teaches challenging Math. If you do well at the camp here, you'll do well at school."

"You not only learn Math here. You learn the social structure of the Math world!"

"My son arrived safely to Denver yesterday. He was VERY happy. Sounds like camp was a great experience for him. Thank You."

"Thanks again Kelly and do keep us posted on the camp schedule for next year!! "

Math Zoom Summer Camp opens today. Hosted by the Founding Director Dr. Kevin Wang, the Opening Ceremony was held at 7PM at the Bronco Student Center at Cal Poly Pomona. Campers and their parents from all over the United States and four foreign countries China, Romania, Korea, and Japan. The ceremony is open to the public. Total there were about 280 people attended the ceremony. The MathMagician Art Benjamin had an outstanding performance at the Opening Ceremony. It was an evening of Fun Math and Excitement.

The Math Zoom Summer Camp 2009 Opening Ceremony is to be held on Sunday July 26th at 7PM in Cal Poly Pomona. The event will be open to the general public. Registration is being taken by phone or email. The event will feature Dr. Art Benjamin, Math Professor at Harvey Mudd College, who brings the Math fun to its extreme by performing Math Magic on stage. He even did shows in prestigious stages like Magic Castle in Hollywood. Follow this link to see a video about Art Benjamin.

The American Regional Math League took place on May 29th and 30th at four locations University of Neveda, Las Vegas, University of Iowa, Penn State University, and University of Georgia. Once again, Math Zoom Academy sponsored the competition and assisted the event in Los Vegas. It's noteworthy that the bright students who have participated in Math Zoom programs are now representing quite a few teams in the ARML competition. Follow this link to see the official results.

At the event in Las Vegas, Math Zoom coaches Dr. Kevin Wang and Kelly Ren also made friends with the team from Macao, who used the Chinese version of the ARML contest questions translated by Dr. Wang and Ms. Ren.

Dr. Kevin Wang was interviewed by Qi Jie in the Everyday Topic show on the Pheonix TV Network today at 7:30PM Pacific Time. The interview covered the career prospect of Mathematician, Math Education in China and US, and Math Olympiad and other Math Competitions. The interview is in Chinese. Follow this link to see the recording.

The results of the 38th USA MATHEMATICAL OLYMPIAD are announced today by AMC. The contest was held on April 28 and 29, 2009. There were total 535 students participated the USAMO contest. The top score is 38. The average score is 7. The median score is 4.

Highest Ranking Individuals

Honorable Mention

The Raytheon MATHCOUNTS National Competition is being held in Oralando, Florida from May 7 to 9, 2009. Bobby Shen, a third time participant of the National MathCounts competition, was victorious in the intense, one-on-one Countdown Round where the top 12 Mathletes competed for the title of this year's Raytheon MATHCOUNTS National Champion. David Yang of Walnut, California was awarded the second-place individual title with Alan Zhou of Lexington, Massachusetts, and Max Schindler of St. Louis, Missouri, advancing to the Semi-finals.

Max Schindler won the Master Round of the competition held on the 9th of May. The master round tests three things, the correctness in answering the questions, presentation skills, and the response to judges' questions. All attendees in the Master Round were impressed by the performance of Max Schindler. He demonstrated strong leadership quality that is highly valued in the Math Zoom philosophy. It's worth to mention that Max along with his sister both made to the national competition. Big applauds for the Schindler family.

David Yang won the written round, by winning the tie breaker over Max Schindler. Bobby Shen was placed 3rd in the written round with 1 point short.

Alexander Clifton of New Jersey, also a Math Zoom Summer Camp participant, made to the top 12 list to participate the countdown round in the national competition as well. Alexander along with another Math Zoom Summer Camp participant David Wong represented New Jersey State Team. Jimmy Park represented Washington D. C.

Math Zoom hosted the Southern California ARML Local Contest in the South Coast Chinese Culture Center in Irvine. Six teams of 6 members each including four Math Zoom teams identifed by colors Green, Blue, Yellow and Red, and two teams from Northwood High School participated in the competition at this location. There are more than 75 teams participated in the contest held locally nationwide and internationally. The Math Zoom Green Team is placed No.1.

David Yang, Thomas Swayze, Paolo Gentili, and Aritro Biswas placed in the top 10 in Southern California MathCounts, held on March 21, 2009 in UCI. David Yang placed No. 1 for the second time in a row. Thomas Swayze won the 2nd. First time participant Aritro Biswas won the 9th place. Paolo Gentili won the 5th place for the 2nd time as well. Here is the list of the top 10 winners in the individual competition:
1. David Yang, Home School; 2. Thomas Swayze, Rhoades Middle School; 3. Brian Wagner, Harbor Day School; 4. Kevin Zhang, Suzanne Middle School; 5. Paolo Gentili, Carmel Valley Middle School; 6. Alex Wong, Earl Warren Middle School; 7. Brandon Zeng, Carmel Valley Middle School; 8. Michelle Lin, Palos Verdes Middle School; 9. Atritro Biswas, First Avenue Middle School; 10. Thomas Moon, Goleta Valley Middle School The California State level competition is divided into two events for Southern California and Northern California. The Northern California contest will be held on March 28, 2009. The tope scorers will be compared after that. The California team will be determined then.

Other students who won the Chapter level and advanced to participate the State level competition include Bryan Brzycki, Cameron Yang, Michelle Wong, Michael Wong, Ryan Yoo.

Math Zoom will host the 2009 ARML Local contest in Irvine on March 21. ARML Local is a national math contest held by ARML, with a similar format as the national ARML contest in May. It is open to all middle schools, and high schools. Each school may field one or more teams of 6 students. Tentatively, it is scheduled at 3pm on March 21, and will last about 3.5 hours. To register as a school team, please do so at the ARML website. To register as an individual and be part of Math Zoom's team, or for further information regarding location, please email info@mathzoom.org.

AMC 10/12 results are posted. Basded on incomplete survey, more than 50 Math Zoom students qualified for AIME. Congratulations to our AMC 10 perfect scorers: Stephen Yoo, Henry Wang, and Jong Wook Kim.

MATHCOUNTS East San Gabriel Valley Chapter Competition was held at Cal Poly Pomona on February 28, 2009. Jong Wook Kim, a Math Zoom student, was the winner in both the individual round and the countdown round. The MATHCOUNTS individual round consists of Sprint round and Target round. In the Sprint round students have 40 minutes to answer 30 questions. In the Target round they answer 4 pairs of questions, with 6 minutes for each pair. Each Sprint round question counts as one point and each Target round question counts as two points.

The top 16 finishers in the individual round advance to the Countdown round. Because the second place winner, David Yang, had to leave before the Countdown round, the 17th place student was chosen for the Countdown round in his place. The Countdown round students are (in no particular order): Jessica Romero, Biannca Li, Kevin Zhao, Cameron Yang, Aritro Biswas, Kory Chen, Andrew Lai, Jong Wook Kim, Hu Lin, Justin Leong, Chris Chen, Wesley Shao, Daniel Begasso, Jacob K, Quinn Wang, Bryan Brzycki.

During the Countdown round, two students face each other to answer math questions in 45 seconds or less, and the winners of each round are paired up for the next round until one final winner is determined. The top three students in the countdown round are Jong Wook Kim, Bryan Brzycki, and Aritro Biswas, all of whom are Math Zoom students.

Math Zoom students among the individual round winners are: Jong Wook Kim (#1), David Yang (#2), Bryan Brzycki (#4), Aritro Biswas (#6), Cameron Yang (#8). During the Team round, students work in four-member teams to answer 10 questions in 20 minutes. Each Team round question is worth 2 points, and the Team winners are determined by combining the average Individual Round score among team members and the Team round score. The Team round winner is Chaparral Middle School. Jong Wook Kim, David Yang, Bryan Brzycki, and Cameron Yang advanced to State competition, either as individuals or as part of a winning team.

The MATHCOUNTS State Competition (Sothern California Division) will be held on March 21, 2009, at UC Irvine.

Congratulations to the winners of the National Honor Roll Award: Brandon Luo (7th grader), Chuning sun (8th grader), Jennifer Lu (4th grader). Congratulations to the winners of the National Merit Achievement Award: Jennifer Lu (4th grader), Albert Lu (2nd grader), William Fu (5th grader), Victor Li (5th grader). This is a partial list of our student achievements. Check back to our Website for more results.