How many dc get top marks in UKMT maths challenge?

[avocadoze]

The boundaries for the IMC are higher this year than last year - 110 for the Y9 Olympiad up to 120 for the Y11s. Does anyone know how many dc got full marks (135)? One of mine did but I don’t know whether it’s a rarity this year, as it seems to have been quite an easy IMC paper?

Well, they invite about 600 to do the Maclaurin round, which suggests that somewhere around that number of year 11s got 120+. Since each question is worth 5/6 marks, that means they only dropped a couple of questions at most (or 3 of the easier ones, but it's relatively unlikely they'd have done that and got all the 6-markers). I would guess there will have been a fair number on 135.

We reckoned that some of the 6-mark questions were relatively easy for that part of the paper.

Good point - I hadn’t thought of that: 600 students in Y11 dropping 0, 1 or 2 questions. It’s probably possible to model the distribution, given the details of the various boundaries and the knowledge of how they are set. I expect that a sizeable chunk of the Y11s got full marks, as well as the Y10s, who could drop 3 questions, and the younger ones who could drop only 4 of the hard questions. Wow. Thinking about it that way makes it clear what an unusual year it was.

Naive question, what is UKMT and what is Olympiad, what are criteria? (I should have googled first)

UKMT = UK maths trust
They run competitions for secondary school children. These are the Junior Maths Challenge (Y8 and below), Intermediate Maths Challenge (Y11 and below), Senior Maths Challenge (Y13 and below).

If a child does well enough on the maths challenge (top 600 or so in year group) they are invited to do an Olympiad which is a harder competition. 200 000 children did the intermediate maths challenge this year, so it’s pretty good to qualify for the Olympiad.

Green Depending on the ability of your child it is possible for this to completely pass you by as schools will only enter top set (or top and 2nd). They are meant to be fun and doable for the children who enter, neither of which would be the case for mid-low ability pupils.

Thanks! Maybe thats why I havent heard anything from the school or my daughter who is in yr7. Its fair that she has been focusing on sports so much more than academic these days.

Can I just ask when you heard the result - we haven't heard anything yet?

The thresholds are a lot higher this year, my Yr 9 did it last year in Yr 8 and got through to the kangaroo so is hoping for the Cayley this year.

Also Greenleave if your dd is in yr7 she may be put in for the Junior maths challenge which is in the summer term.

We haven't heard anything yet, I'm really hoping DS will be awarded a certificate as it'll boost his confidence - yr 11 and stressing about exams at the moment! He's managed to get either a bronze or silver in previous years 🤞🏻

IMC results were out earlier this week.

I think at some private secondary schools they tend to ask all students to sit the challenge regardless the ability for the first round.
Junior challenge accepts all students who are from year 8 and under.
Intermediate for someone between year 11 and year 9.
Senior is for year 13 and below.
Last year DD was in Y6 and got into Junior Kangaroo with a Merit (top 25%) so this year we are hoping for Olympiad with all fingers and toes crossed.

I know someone who got through on 123. But he's year 10.

The UKMT new system failed to email many schools to tell them to download their results. My email didn’t come through, despite them using it for other stuff. So I only got our results today!

Very proud teacher though, 4 gold, 8 silver and 13 bronze, plus 8 grey kangaroos. All pupils in years 6-8 and of the four golds two were in yr 6 😀

(Finally!) Heard today he got into the Cayley (he got 118) - he seems strangely meh about it - hey ho teenagers!

Excellent news Grouching! Although I know ds2’s score, I’m still waiting for ds1’s results and he’s hoping for Cayley too.