Mathematics Olympiad delivers more than a thousand gold medals on the 5th

Winner of the gold medal at the 16th Brazilian Mathematics Olympiad for Public Schools (Obmep) and bronze in the following edition, Isabela Besen is preparing to take, this Tuesday (30), the first phase test of the 18th competition. “I’m very anxious”, said Isabela, who was the first Obmep gold medalist in her city, Campos Novos, located in the mountain mesoregion of Santa Catarina. Isabela is encouraging other young women to enter the competition. “Several colleagues came to me for advice on how to pass the test.” She and another 1,088 young people from all over the country will gather in Florianópolis, on the next 5th, to participate in the biggest national award ceremony by Obmep. “We have never had so many students being awarded. Due to the pandemic, we were unable to organize the award ceremony, so this year we are going to award students who won gold medals in 2021 and 2022. There will be more than a thousand students present at the ceremony, from all over Brazil, many of will travel by plane for the first time”, said this Monday (29) to Agência Brasil the deputy director of the Institute of Pure and Applied Mathematics (Impa) and general coordinator of Obmep, Claudio Landim. Typically, the national competition has 575 gold medalists. Students will arrive in Florianópolis on Sunday (4) and, during the three days of the event, will participate in academic activities, exchange experiences and attend a lecture by Impa researcher Paulo Orenstein, who is part of the Impa Project and Innovation Center (Centro Pi) about data science and artificial intelligence (AI). Honorees At the ceremony, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who held the same position in 2005, when Obmep was created, will be honored, in addition to other personalities who were part of the history of the Olympics. The list includes the Minister of Finance, Fernando Haddad, who headed the Ministry of Education at the time of Obmep’s creation; former Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation Sergio Rezende, professor at the Federal University of Pernambuco; the mayor of Eduardo Paes and the municipal secretary of Education of Rio de Janeiro, Renan Ferreirinha, who was a multi-medalist for Rio de Janeiro as a student. “We hope to count on President Lula’s presence, because it was during his administration that Obmep was created, and he has always been very supportive of the project”, stated Landim. The current Ministers of Science, Technology and Innovations, Luciana Santos, and of Education, Camilo Santana, were also invited. The 1,089 participants in the competition will travel with the delegations from their states, accompanied by a teacher, to receive the gold medal in person. The event is promoted by Obmep, which bears the costs of transport, accommodation and food for the participants. Claudio Landim informed that the largest delegations are those from São Paulo and Minas Gerais, but he stressed that all of Brazil will be represented at the ceremony. He mentioned, among others, the states of Piauí, Ceará, Espírito Santo, Acre, Amazonas, Amapá and Rondônia. New edition The 18th edition of Obmep, which holds its first phase of tests this Tuesday, reveals two records: the number of enrolled schools reached 55,300 institutions and that of cities, 5,563, corresponding to 99.87% of Brazilian municipalities. As a result, 18.3 million students will participate in the competition, taking a multiple-choice test with 20 questions. The test will help schools classify 5% of students at each level who will participate in the second stage, scheduled for October 7th. The competition brings together participants from the 6th year of elementary school to the 3rd year of high school. The Olympics encourages the study of mathematics, in addition to promoting social inclusion and contributing to improving the quality of basic education, allowing more students to have access to quality didactic material. Obmep is carried out by Impa, with support from the Brazilian Society of Mathematics and resources from the Ministries of Education and Science, Technology and Innovation.

Agência Brasil