News Release

College hosts 26th Mathcounts competition Feb. 13

January 28, 2010

Lower Dauphin Middle School will be seeking its second consecutive team title when students from 18 area schools converge on Penn State Harrisburg’s Capital Union Building for the 26th annual MATHCOUNTS competition Saturday, Feb. 13.

A nationwide program for 6th, 7th, and 8th grade students designed to promote excellence in mathematics through coaching and competition, the regional MATHCOUNTS event is a 26-year partnership between Penn State Harrisburg and the Harrisburg Chapter of the Society of Professional Engineers.

Supporting Penn State Harrisburg’s outreach commitment to the community while spurring interest in mathematics and related careers for middle school students, the program is designed to build skills, promote strategic problem solving, and instruct students in dealing with complex problems and hard-to-handle numbers – all critical ingredients in today’s technological society.

Local chapter members, Penn State Harrisburg student, faculty, and staff volunteers, and sponsors distribute materials to participating schools, coordinate the event, perform fund-raising duties, provide lunches, score and tabulate the results, and present the awards.

The annual coaching phase begins in the fall, covering everything from basic arithmetic skills to math logic, probability and statistics, linear algebra, and polynomials. The competitions start in January with in-school qualifying tests, followed by the February regional event. Each year, more than 500,000 students across America are exposed to MATHCOUNTS at the local school level.

On Feb. 13, Lower Dauphin Middle School will be pitted against 17 other teams in the competition which begins with the Sprint Round at 9:45 a.m. and follows with the Target Round at 10:30 a.m., and the Team Round at 11:25 a.m. The Countdown Round at 1:05 p.m. during which the top 10 individual mathematicians compete, is open to the public as well as the Awards Presentation at 2 p.m.

The top four individual winners and the top school team from the regional competition will advance to the Pennsylvania state event March 26 and 27 at the Harrisburg-Hershey Sheraton. The top four individual winners in the state event advance to the National Raytheon MATHCOUNTS Competition in Orlando, Fla. May 6 to 9.
In addition to Lower Dauphin, other schools competing this year include:

Dauphin County – Central Dauphin Middle School, Hershey Middle School, Middletown Area Middle School, Saint Margaret Mary School, Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary School, and Susquehanna Township Middle School.

Cumberland County – Allen Middle School, Camp Hill Middle School, Good Hope Middle School, Harrisburg Academy, Lamberton Middle School, Mechanicsburg Middle School, Saint Joseph School, Saint Patrick School, and Saint Theresa School.

Juniata County – Tuscarora Junior High School.

York County – Crossroads Middle School.