Berkeley Heights Students To Compete In Math Challenge In NYC For Scholarship Money

Berkeley Heights, NJ -- Five Berkely Heights students will compete in the finals of a major national mathematics competition in New York City.

Alexander Ju, Gianna Miggins, Niyant Narang, Anna Song and Michael Wu of Governor Livingston High School were selected out of 5,000 11th and 12th grade students from across the nation as finalists in the popular Moody’s Mega Math (M3) Challenge.

Together, they make up one of six teams chosen to compete in the M3 Challenge finals competition, which takes place on April 25 at The Moody’s World Trade Center headquarters.

“We are absolutely thrilled,” said Steve Hess, coach of the Berkeley Heights team and an AP Economics teacher at Governor Livingston High School.

Now in its 11th year, the M3 Challenge requires students to use mathematical modeling to recommend solutions to real-world problems – in this case, the future of the auto industry, from car-sharing to driverless technologies, according to a release on the competition.

The school has participated in the competition every year since 2006, but each time the teams have only gotten honorable mentions. This is the first time a team has advanced to the finals.

“I really was surprised,” Hess said of his team making it this far. “We have terrific kids but I knew there were at least 1,000 teams competing from across the country. A lot of schools that participate are math and science magnet schools. Schools that are attacking problems like this regularly. This is not the kind of problems we are solving on a regular basis in class.”

The challenge began in late February when participating students had 14 hours to study the issue in question, collect data and devise models before submitting their solutions online in the form of a research paper.

Now, the 1,100 teams that participated in the contest have been narrowed down to six which, in addition to Governor Livingston High School, include high schools in Carmel, IN, Durham, NC, Houston, TX, Providence, RI and Silver Spring, MD. Each team will vie for top spot in the challenge as well as a share of $150,000 in scholarship prizes that is up for grabs.

The Berkeley Heights students studied during their Spring Break to be ready for the finals, Hess said.

On April 25, the six teams will each give a 15 minute presentation on their solution and then answer follow-up questions from the judges while defending their thesis.

The judges will then meet and announce the top 3 winners.

For more information about the M3 Challenge, visit m3challenge.siam.org . To access this year’s challenge problem, visit https://m3challenge.siam.org/monthly-dialogue/2016-challenge-problem-share-and-car-share-alike-modeling-new-approaches-mobility .

(Photo provided: Coach Steven Hess with Alexander Ju, Gianna Miggins, Niyant Narang, Anna Song and Michael Wu of Governor Livingston High School)