For the fourth consecutive year, students from Edgewood Middle School have qualified for the state MathCounts competition.
Eighth-graders Josh Miller, Stephen Shen, Nic Jansen and Deju Huang will represent Warsaw Schools Saturday at Purdue University, West Lafayette, at 9 a.m.
According to coach Noel Howett, students from the Edgewood team competed in regionals Feb. 5 at IPFW, Fort Wayne, to advance to this weekend's state contest. If they place at the top, they could go on to national competition in Washington, D.C., this summer.
During the competition, students start with a succession of two tests to start with, Howett said. Each test is about 40 minutes long with 30 questions. There's a sprint round, then a team round. After tests are scored, the top 18 to 19 get to participate in a countdown round like "Jeopardy" with math questions.
At regionals, Miller earned fourth place to advance to state as an individual.
"I was excited," Miller said. "It was sort of unexpected. I thought there were so many people there I wouldn't get in the top four."
Howett said the team's score also was good enough for them to get called to state competition. More than 200 individuals will be competing Saturday.
"We just do a lot of problems," Howett said regarding how they are preparing for state.
Edgewood's math team meets Tuesdays and Thursdays after school. They get together in groups, eat snacks and play math, Howett said.For some of the problems, students can use their calculators, but not all of them. They're not just computation problems, but also problem solving questions.
Shen said he was "excited" about state Saturday.
"Just to be there, I suppose, it's an honor to just be there," said Huang.
