The Peru Gazette

L-R Harrison Matthews, Quinn Atwood, Mrs. Jennifer Dyer, Isaac Mitchell

By John T. Ryan

Peru – Peru Middle School students Isaac Mitchell, Quinn Atwood, Harrison Matthews and Olivia Baldwin have something in common – They all love math. (Olivia Baldwin could not be present for our interview)

On February 10th they participated in the 35th Annual MATHCOUNTS competition at Clinton Community College. MATHCOUNTS is a nationwide mathematics competition. It’s founding sponsors include the National Society of Professional Engineers, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics and the CNA Foundation.

Thirty-six students from five area schools participated in the local competition. Isaac Mitchell finished second. This Saturday he will compete in the New York State MATHCOUNTS Competition at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy.

Math teacher Jennifer Dyer has led MATHCOUNTS at Peru Middle School for the past eleven years. She loves the program. She explained, “It fosters curiosity and shows the students that math is nothing to fear. It’s about problem solving. Math has a stigma of being scary, when it can be fun. The kids get excited about it. It’s not physical, it’s mental. It’s showing their strengths.”

The participating students were all volunteers. Eighth grader Isaac Mitchell explained, “It’s stressful, but fun at the same time. I figured it would be a good way to see how I place against other people in my community.” Seventh grader Quinn Atwood said, “I thought it would be a fun experience. I’ve always been very good at math. I knew how to multiply in the first grade.” Seventh grader Harrison Matthews had a practical reason. He said, “I love math and there are many jobs with math involved.”

All three students have an idea what they’d like to be someday and not so surprisingly the jobs require math skills. Isaac said, “I’d like to be an anesthesiologist or a forensic scientist.” Quinn responded, “I’d like to be a robotics engineer and computer scientist.” Harrison said, “I’d like to be an architect.”

Jennifer Dyer and Isaac’s family will travel to RPI to watch Saturday’s competition. The Peru Gazette wishes Isaac the best of luck and we congratulate Mrs. Dyer for her extra effort to help her students grow their love of mathematics.

Competition at Clinton Community College