July 18, 2015
Mathematical Association of America /MAA.org
2015 IMO Team with their USAMO Medals in Chiang Mai, Thailand.
A six-person team representing the United States at the 56th International Mathematical Olympiad turned the stereotype of Americans and their lousy math skills on its head with a victory at the competition held in Chiang, Mei, Thailand from July 4 to July 13.
This year's top honors represent a first for the U.S. team since 1994. Final scores are determined based on points accumulated by individual team members who are given six problems in sets of three to solve in 4.5 hour sessions over two days. With a combined score of 184, the U.S. narrowly defeated China's second place score of 181 points and the Republic of Korea's third place score of 161.
The IMO is the World Championship Mathematics Competition for high school students, expanding from 7 countries in 1959 to more than 100 countries on six continents today.
Ryan Alweiss, Allen Liu, Yang Liu, Shyam Narayanan, and David Stoner of the U.S. team were all awarded gold medals, while Michael Kural earned a silver medal, just missing gold by a single point.
Below is an example of one of the problems on this year's test.
The full list of problems at this year's competition can be found here.
