From Left to Right: Emily Mynes, Landon Quick, Harshal Shah, Hallum Ryan, Kavya Shah, Jaxson Cooper, Sylas Carpenter, Mrs. Skulski
LEXINGTON PARK, Md. — Esperanza Middle School’s MATHCOUNTS team secured a fourth-place finish in the Southern Maryland Chapter Competition on Saturday, Feb. 1, qualifying for the Maryland State MATHCOUNTS Competition for the first time in five years.
The regional competition, sponsored by the Southern Maryland Electric Cooperative (SMECO), took place at Calvert High School and included students from Charles, Calvert, and St. Mary’s counties. The top teams from the chapter earned a spot in the state competition, which is set for Saturday, March 15, at the McDonogh School in Owings Mills.
The four students representing Esperanza Middle School at the state competition are Emily Mynes, Landon Quick, Harshal Shah, and Jaxson Cooper.
“We just had our chapter competition, which included Charles, Calvert, and St. Mary’s counties. So, all the middle schools in the county participated,” said Mary Skulski, Esperanza Middle School’s MATHCOUNTS coach. “The makeup of the competition is students compete both individually, and then each school has one specific team of four that is part of the team portion. Each student competes in three rounds: the sprint round, the target round, and the team round. We had seven participants from Esperanza.”
This marks a major milestone for Esperanza Middle School’s MATHCOUNTS program. While the school had an individual competitor qualify for the state competition last year, this is the first time the full team has advanced in five years.
The MATHCOUNTS Foundation, a national nonprofit, provides engaging math programs for middle school students in grades 6-8 to build confidence and problem-solving skills. The MATHCOUNTS Competition Series consists of four rounds that test speed, accuracy, and teamwork.
As the team prepares for the state-level competition, Skulski emphasized the importance of practice and persistence.
“We meet every Monday after school,” she said. “We go over a bunch of different math problems that the MATHCOUNTS organization provides. They have a coach’s handbook each year, so we have a lot of problems to pull from. And that’s the best way to prepare—just working through math problems after school. The last couple of weeks, we’ve gone through several past competitions.”
Skulski expressed pride in her students’ hard work and encouraged more students to take an interest in math.
“I was very proud of them all,” she said. “They did good. I would like readers to know just to encourage students to keep working with math and taking risks with math. Because that’s what I enjoy telling my students—it’s okay to be wrong. We just have to keep working at the problems to try to figure them out. We’re always looking for more students to enjoy math, love math, and try to work through it.”
The top four Mathletes from the Maryland State Competition will advance to the national MATHCOUNTS competition, representing the state on a national stage.
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