Students represent Rocky Boy at North Central Mathcounts competition

Six young math enthusiasts from Rocky Boy’s Indian Reservation participated in a regional math competition Wednesday in Heritage Hall at Great Falls College-Montana State University.

Morgaine Lomayesva, who works in the information technology department for the Rocky Boy School District, said sixth- and seventh-grade students who were part of Rocky Boy’s math club participated in the North Central Mathcounts competition.

The competition is for students grades six through eight.

Lomayesva said multiple schools took part, though she couldn’t say how many. Rocky Boy was the only reservation school that competed this year.

Mathcounts competitions take place on the regional, state and national level.

Lomayesva, who said she participated in the competition when she was in middle school, compared the competition to the Scripps National Spelling Bee.

She said that, often times, achievements in mathematics are not celebrated enough, and the competition is a way to do that.

“It is fun. You get to hang out with a whole bunch of other people who are good at math and there is a certain level of excitement and competition to it,” Lomayesva said.

Contestants demonstrate their math skills in four rounds she said.  

“These tests are also kind of an endurance thing. You are doing math straight for almost four hours,” Lomayesva said.    

Activities include a sprint round where students work to solve 30 problems in 40 minutes and more sprint rounds where four sets of students try to solve two math problems in six minutes.

Schools also take part in the countdown round, where 10 students using buzzers go head to head and are alloted 45 seconds to solve several math problems.

Lomayesva said two other competitions also put students’ collaborative and test-taking skills to work when each school puts together a team of four students. Members of each team work within their group to solve problems.

She said the tests are difficult and involve a different skill set than doing math individually.

“Sitting there and doing it individually is a little different than getting up and saying what the answer is, especially in front of your peers in middle school,” Lomayesva said.

She said some of the Rocky Boy students scored near 30 percent, adding that a score of 10 or 20 percent is considered good while a score of 30 percent is considered excellent.

The two schools with the top highest scores during the team round go on to compete in the state competition.

This year C.R. Anderson from Helena and North Middle School from Great Falls had the highest overall scores.