American Mathematics Competitions
Are you a math super-student? Challenge yourself and gain access to elite invitational math tournaments when you excel in these national math competitions.
The American Mathematics Competitions are a series of examinations and curriculum materials that build problem-solving skills and mathematical knowledge in middle and high school students. Through classroom resources and friendly competition, the MAA AMC program helps America’s educators identify talent and foster a love of mathematics. The MAA AMC program positively impacts the analytical skills needed for future careers in an innovative society. The AMC competitions include: AMC 8 (middle school); AMC 10 and AMC 12 (high school); American Invitational Mathematics Exam (AIME), which is an invitational competition for high scoring participants in AMC 10 and AMC 12; USA Mathematical Olympiad and Junior Mathematical Olympiad, which are the AMC’s top invitational competition for high scoring AIME participants.
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How do I expand this narrative arc? If math is part of your narrative arc consider doing one of the following:
Enter one of the math national and international math competitions including Purple Comet!, Who Wants to be a Mathematician or the Harvard-MIT Math Tournament.
Explore the types of math problems faced by real world mathematicians in the team-based MathWorks Math Modeling Challenge
Challenge yourself to practically apply your math skills at Wharton’s Data Science Academy
HOT TIP: National math competitions are a great way to challenge yourself and deepen your exposure to different types of math problems. Keep in mind that they are a very common extracurricular for kids who love math and might even want to study it in college. This makes it both a great environment to network and make friends in that community, and a potential issue if you want to stand out from your Math Club teammates. Have fun with math competitions, but also think about ways that you can enhance and diversity your profile by supplementing with math-adjacent or more applied-math activities.