Churchill Students Shine in Maths Challenge
This week, Churchill Academy & Sixth Form students were presented with bronze, silver or gold certificates for competing in the United Kingdom Mathematics Trust (UKMT) Challenge.
More than 178 students competed across the senior and intermediate competitions, with 74% scoring high enough to receive a certificate.
“We’d like to congratulate all of our students who have shown both enthusiasm and determination to take part in this extra-curricular challenge,” said Mr Malkin, Director of Faculty for Maths.
“In our eyes, a successful challenge is one where a group of determined and enthusiastic students push themselves with some challenging mathematics. Maths challenge isn’t just for top set maths students. And we hope to see similar levels of participation and determination from the Junior competition later this year,” commented Mr Thomas who’s run the Maths Challenge at Churchill for the past two years.
Year 11 student Bruce Butson not only received his gold certificate, he also qualified for an Olympiad follow-on round – the UKMT’s most prestigious challenge. Bruce is one of only around 600 pupils across the country to have qualified this year, based on his outstanding score in the senior maths challenge.
Bruce said, “I have really enjoyed participating in the maths challenge each year. The problem solving aspect means you have to apply yourself to each question and really focus when you get to the later questions. Having done this each year and competed in all of the different challenges (junior, intermediate and senior), I have always been able to find some interest and entertainment whether that be through the added difficulty or new understanding to answer tough questions I couldn’t answer before. In addition to this, I was able to see how I did against the rest of the country which was really motivating.”