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First-year students and sophomores are invited to participate in the Individual Barge Mathematics Contest 9 a.m.-noon Saturday in Pardee Hall room 227.
Pre-registration is not required. Free lunch will be provided.
The problems vary in difficulty; most emphasize insight and ingenuity rather than specific knowledge or computational skill. Prize amounts are $500 for first place, $300 for second, and $200 for third.
Sample problem: Find the 2004th digit to the right of the decimal point in 0.102030405060708090100110120130140…
For more information, contact organizer Louis Zulli, assistant professor of mathematics.
Another math department contest is the Team Barge Competition, in which groups of three to five students attempt to solve a different weekly problem over eight weeks. The winning team last semester, which shared a $600 prize, included chemical engineering major Maria Azimova ’06 (Tashkent, Uzbekistan), Jacob Carson ’06 (New Richmond, Ohio), and Ekaterina Jager ’05(Tashkent, Uzbekistan), who is pursing a B.S. in electrical & computer engineering and B.A. in mathematics. Second- and third-place teams also split prizes.
The math department also sponsors a Problem Solving Group that meets each week to discuss and solve mathematics problems, which helps students prepare for the Team and Individual Barge Competitions, the Lehigh Valley Association of Independent Colleges (LVAIC) Math Contest, and the William Powell Putnam Mathematical Competition. For the past four years, a Lafayette team has taken first place in the LVAIC Math Contest.