More than 900 people, including basic education students and teachers divided into 230 teams from 20 states, participate this Saturday and Sunday (September 2nd and 3rd) in the final phase of the 39th Unicamp Mathematics Olympiad (OMU), a project carried out by the Institute of Mathematics, Statistics and Scientific Computing (Imecc) of the University.
This year, the competition registered a record number of participants, more than 10 thousand of them, divided into 3 thousand teams from across the country. The groups are made up of elementary school students (eighth and ninth years) and high school students from public and private schools.
For the second year, the final test will be held in person on Saturday and the announcement of the names of the medalists will take place the following day, allowing the teams, many coming from more distant cities, to receive the results in person at an awards ceremony to be held at the Theater Arena, on the Campinas (SP) campus.
The states that have teams called up are: Alagoas (1), Amazonas (3), Bahia (4), Ceará (44), Federal District (7), Espírito Santo (5), Goiás (8), Maranhão (1) , Minas Gerais (18), Pará (3), Pernambuco (21), Piauí (5), Paraná (1), Rio de Janeiro (6), Rio Grande do Norte (2), Rondônia (1), Rio Grande do South (1), Santa Catarina (3), Sergipe (3) and São Paulo (93).
OMU is organized into two levels: Alpha (for students in the eighth and ninth years of elementary school) and Beta (for high school students). At the awards ceremony, gold, silver and bronze medals will be awarded to at least 64 teams. There will also be awards for the quality of writing, totaling 264 medal-winning participants.
A different math olympiad
Unlike other mathematics competitions, OMU is held in teams made up of three students, as well as a responsible teacher. The first two phases take place online, lasting one week each. In these stages, students can debate and seek solutions to the problems presented.
Marcelo Firer, member of the OMU organizing committee and professor at Imecc, explains that the proposal is for participants to answer the questions with argumentation, justify the steps and explain their reasoning.
“The format of the test also makes room for something fundamental for a mathematician, which is formulating and solving problems. Just like in the online stages, the final stage test challenges students to think and look for solutions to the problems presented”, he states.
To make it possible for students and teachers to come to Campinas, the organizing committee provided financial assistance to teams from public schools – without a selection process – that were best ranked in their region.
Olympic vacancies
Students in the final phase of OMU participated in the two online stages, held between April and June. High school students classified in the final team phase will also be able to compete for an individual medal. The student who becomes a gold, silver or bronze medalist in the individual test will be able to participate in the Unicamp Olympic Vacancies notice, which allows them to enter the undergraduate program without the need to take the Entrance Exam.
The courses covered by the notice will be announced this semester, but the organization's expectation is that there will be several courses in the exact sciences area.
Service:
Test: Saturday (2/9) from 8:30 am to 13 pm
Location: Basic Cycle 1 rooms – Unicamp
Awards ceremony: Sunday (3/9) at 14pm
Awards location: Teatro de Arena – Unicamp
