Rhodes College students Blair Kinsey ’24, Hannah Meit ’25, and Lily Whitesell ’24 recently participated in the 84th William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition, which is the preeminent mathematics competition for undergraduate college students in the United States and Canada. During two 3-hour sessions proctored in-person on campus, students solved 12 problems covering a range of material in undergraduate mathematics, including concepts from linear algebra, modern algebra, and number theory. Dr. Chris Mouron of the Department of Mathematics and Statistics is the Putnam supervisor at Rhodes and invited Kinsey, Meit, and Whitesell to take part in the competition.
The rigorous test is administered by the Mathematical Association of America, and the Rhodes students competed with some of the brightest minds from colleges and universities across the country, including Harvard, MIT, and Princeton. Students must show their work to justify a solution, and only blank paper, writing utensils, and erasers are permitted. No rulers, compasses, lined paper, books, graph paper, or computers are allowed.
This year, more than 3,000 undergraduates participated, and the median score in the competition was one, demonstrating the difficulty of the test. In what is believed to be a first for Rhodes, all three students scored above the median, with Kinsey also scoring above the average score for this year.