By Lee Allen, Middle School math teacher, and Anthony Villani, Harley parent: Coaches, Harley School MathCounts team

The Harley Middle School Math Counts team, after a second place finish behind Calkins Road MS at the Monroe County Chapter meet at RIT in February, represented the school at the New York State Invitational meet at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institure in Troy, NY on Saturday, March 17. 

Harley MathCounts team at NYS meet

Students Max Ellis, Maxwell Sun, David Villani and Alexander Wasley competed against over 200 hundred students from 61 other schools from around the state, representing the top finishers from 18 regional chapters including Nassau County, each of the five boroughs of New York City, 4 Westchester and Lower Hudson Valley Regions, and 8 upstate regions stretching from Chautauqua County to the Champlain Valley. The format included a series of individual written sprint and longer-form questions, as well as team competition where students work together under time pressure to solve problems of escalating difficulty. Here is the link to the last year’s Sprint Round if you would like to see an example of what the students had to face under time pressure! No calculators allowed! 🙂

https://www.mathcounts.org/sites/default/files/u5328/2017%20State%20Sprint%20Round.pdf  (answer key and more problems below!) 

Maxwell Sun, first place

Harley eight-grader Maxwell Sun (’22), a second-place statewide finisher in 2017, captured first place in all of New York State after achieving the highest individual score for the day and will be one of 4 New Yorkers representing the state in the Raytheon National MathCounts competition to be held in Washington, D.C. on May 13-14 (and televised on ESPN3!). This is an incredible accomplishment, making Maxwell just the third area student to win states in the past decade, and setting every Harley school record it is possible to set! 

 

The Harley team of Max, Maxwell, David and Alexander improved upon last year’s finish, landing squarely in the top 10 at seventh place! The team score relies equally on all four members’ scores, showing the depth of the team, as well as their hard work and preparation. With three seventh graders on the current team as well as a large, bright group of 6th graders joining Harley MathCounts this year, the future is in good hands as well!

 

 It was amazing to see Harley’s small school take its place in the state rankings next to the entrance-exam-only NYC specialty schools and large districts like Scarsdale and Jericho. Please join coaches Lee Allen and Anthony Villani in congratulating the students, thanking the parents for all their support, and in wishing Maxwell the very best as he represents the school at Nationals.