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SPGS Student invited to UK Maths Trust Training Camp
SPGS Student invited to UK Maths Trust Training Camp
Ananya S. (VI) was one of just 40 Year 10 and 11 students from across the UK selected to attend the UK Mathematics Trust's August British Mathematical Olympiad training camp at Churchill College, Cambridge. In her own words, Ananya reflects on the mathematical challenges, friendships and memorable moments that made the experience so rewarding.Over the summer, I had the wonderful opportunity to attend the UKMT’s August BMO training camp in Churchill College, Cambridge. I was one of 40 students across Year 10 and Year 11 in the UK to be invited, and after settling into our dorms and exploring the grounds, we kicked off with some fun mathematical icebreakers and the most mathematical register I’ve ever come across to set the tone for the week: someone would shout ‘biject!’ and we would try to call out our attendee numbers – the outputs we’d been mapped to – in order (like most non-standard registers, this was rarely successful).
Although our ability to count to forty gradually deteriorated, our mathematical knowledge hugely benefited from the variety of fascinating lecture-style sessions we attended. Every day, we spent three hours in the morning on geometry and number theory, where we banished all assumptions to rigorously prove theorems about primes and donned colouring pencils to declutter our diagrams as we learnt increasingly complex configurations. Various newer topics, including invariants and inequalities, filled the afternoons. One lecture I found particularly interesting was on graph theory, where we proved complex theorems like Euler’s Polyhedron Formula starting completely from scratch! The week culminated in a difficult Olympiad-style test, and we were glad to see how much we had improved by the end of the week.
Perhaps even more than the lectures, I thoroughly enjoyed spending the week with other maths enthusiasts. From walking in matching green shirts around Cambridge and watching the solar eclipse, to rushing outside with our books during lunch to finish that last geometry question, to being kicked out of the club room for working too late (and too loudly!) on a hard problem, the camp atmosphere was fantastic, and I’m grateful for the lasting friendships I made that week.
Ananya S. (VI)
