Student teams from Mary H. Matula and Malcolm elementary schools earned the top spots in their grade-level division at the Elementary Math Challenge held Saturday, April 22 at Theodore G. Davis Middle School. The event is for fourth- and fifth-grade students and is a two-part mathematics challenge that includes both a team and individual competition.
Teams from all 21 Charles County public elementary schools competed. The team challenge requires students to work together to solve four multi-step problems within a 30-minute period.
Matula’s fourth-grade team earned a total of 168 points during the team challenge and earned first place. Team members are Garrett Carson, Michael Cheney, Sarah Dang, Andrew Donoho, Noah Mitchell, Cayden Souders and Ava Weibrecht. Coach of the team is Jessica Meador, a fourth-grade teacher at Matula.
J.C. Parks Elementary School’s fourth-grade team won second place, followed by the team from William B. Wade Elementary School in third place, the team from Malcolm in fourth place, and the team from Dr. James Craik Elementary School in fifth place.
Malcolm’s fifth-grade team earned a total of 185.5 points during the team challenge and earned the first-place award. Students on the team include Andrew Bell, Carley Bowie, Nyla Deluca-Thomas, Carina Elrod, Zoe Mudd, Riley Rollins and Thomas Shields. Coach of the team is Shayna Hyde, the second-grade teacher at Malcolm.
Wade’s fifth-grade team earned second place, followed by the Matula fifth-grade team in third place, the Mt Hope/Nanjemoy Elementary School team in fourth place, and the fifth-grade team from Craik earned fifth place.
In the individual portion of the competition, each team member takes an online test of 30 math problems and has 30 minutes to complete them. The top five individual scores are added to the team score to compute a team’s overall score.
In first place among competing fourth graders was Julie Perriello from Wade, followed by Presley Shaffier, also from Wade, in second place, and Monica Rivas-Parker from C. Paul Barnhart Elementary School in third place.
In the individual competition for fifth-graders, Craik’s Rachel Chernoff received first place, followed by Walter J. Mitchell Elementary School student Patrick Hernandez in second place, and Matula’s Will Alcorn in third place.
The top five teams, as well as the top three individuals, at each grade level, received a plaque and the top scoring student on each team received a medal. All competing students received a participant ribbon and certificate. A total of 277 students participated in the 2017 competition. The annual event is sponsored by Southern Maryland Electric Cooperative (SMECO). Visit SMECO’s website at http://www.smeco.com/news.aspx for more information.
