Deer Park leads local march to Mathcounts event

Two teams of math whizzes will compete in March at a state competition, after impressive performances at a district tournament earlier this month.

Teams from Deer Park and Cayuse Prairie schools claimed the top two slots at the district Mathcounts competition Feb. 11. It’s the third straight year that Deer Park has won the local contest, coach Dan Block said.

“We’ve had a pretty good run the last three years, for sure,” he said.

Eighth-grader Marissa Barnes, sixth-grader Colin Norick, and Colter Norick and Pascale Yacavone, both seventh-graders, were members of the winning team.

Tor Jackola and Kindra Weaver, both in eighth grade, and seventh-graders Livia Jackola and Sarah Peterson also competed for Deer Park.

Barnes was the top individual performer at the competition. Colter Norick finished third overall, and Colin Norick was the fourth-ranked individual.

Block said a scheduling change was partially responsible for Deer Park’s win. This year the school shortened its break times to free up a 30-minute period for an advanced math class, which Mathcounts competitors take in addition to their regular math class.

Students who aren’t part of the teams or who aren’t ready for the advanced class may use the period to get extra help with math, Block said.

But the extra period isn’t solely responsible for Deer Park’s success in the competition. Block said his team is driven to do well.

“We just have hardworking kids that motivate each other. They want to just get on our ‘A’ team. They want to be the best,” he said.

Connor Roettig and Matthew Bartos, both in eighth grade, seventh-grader Chandler Eddie and sixth-grader Alex Naglich made up Cayuse Prairie’s second-place team.

Naglich finished second overall in individual scores. Roettig came in ninth.

The Mathcounts competition features a series of math assessments in which students work individually and as a team.

The first round is the “sprint round,” said Jason Christy, who coached Cayuse Prairie. Students have 40 minutes to solve 30 different problems that get progressively difficult. Children score a point for each correct answer, Christy said.

The next round is the “target round,” which features a “series of four different six-minute-long, two-question batteries,” he said.

Students have six minutes to answer both questions in each “battery,” Christy added. Correct answers earn two points.

The final round is the team round, in which teams may work together to solve 10 questions. Correct answers earn one point each, Christy said.

Deer Park and Cayuse Prairie will move on to the state competition, which will be held March 9 at Montana State University in Bozeman. Winners at the state level will move on to the 2011 Raytheon Mathcounts National Competition May 5-8 in Washington, D.C.

In addition to the top squads, the top two individuals who weren’t part of one of the winning teams will get the chance to compete at state.

Those slots go to eighth-grader Zac Daniels of Ronan, who came in fifth, and Josiah Gardner, an eighth-grader from Helena Flats School who finished sixth overall.

Ryan Dresen, a seventh-grader from Ronan, eighth-grader Andrew Obst of Fair-Mont-Egan, and Ronan’s Natayia McDougall, also an eighth-grader, rounded out the top 10.

Ronan coach Shawn Harris said she was excited that three of her students finished among the top 10.

“It was kind of an awesome thing for us” because this year’s team was young, she said.

A team from Bigfork Middle School — eighth-grader Zoe Zander and seventh-graders Ross Coleman, Jason Bunch and Zack Hider — came in third overall at the district competition.

Russel Goeden, Jacob Haberlock, Adam Jordt, Karlee Park, Joseph Potkonjak and Kobe Sagami, all seventh-graders, also competed for Bigfork, coach Jessica Johnson said.

Obst, Dawson VanArtsdale, Janae Moon and Heather Fantino, all eighth-graders, made up Fair-Mont-Egan’s fourth-place team. Sixth-graders Hanna Maxwell and Nathan Moon and eighth-graders Jandi Maxwell and Gabe Steller also competed for Fair-Mont-Egan, according to coach Judy Peterson.

For additional information about the Mathcounts program, visit www.mathcounts.org.

Reporter Kristi Albertson may be reached at 758-4438 or at kalbertson@dailyinterlake.com.