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Register for the Putnam Competition

Sept. 10, 2018
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This year's William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition will be on Saturday, Dec. 1, 2018.

There will be two sessions: 9 a.m. to noon and 2-5 p.m. You must sit both sessions.

The room for the competition is LH2064.

Registration

To register for the competition, email Associate Professor Shengda Hu by noon on Friday, Sept. 28.

Training Sessions

You don't have to register to attend the training sessions. On the other hand, if you do prepare to participate in the Putnam Competition, then you should register, as it will be very helpful for your preparation.

To register, please fill out the Putnam Training Session Registration Form. by NOON on Friday Sept. 21, 2018.

Schedule

The training sessions are on Tuesdays, 4-5 p.m. in room LH3053.

The sessions will start on Tuesday, Sept. 25, 2018, and the last session is on Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2018. There is no session on Oct. 9, 2018 due to the reading week.

If a student is interested in participating in the training sessions, s/he can also send an email to shu@wlu.ca or pzhang@wlu.ca by NOON on Friday Sept. 21, 2018.

The following is a tentative (meaning the order or content of the sessions might change) list of sessions. The topics will roughly follow the book Putnam and Beyond, which can be downloaded in its entirety. Depending on the time available, not all topics will be covered.

To get the most out of these sessions, it is important to prepare for the topics that will be covered before coming to them, and work as many problems as possible afterwards. Reading the examples and trying some of the problems would be a good way to prepare. You need to understand your weakness in order to get stronger.

  • Sept. 25: Introduction, problems from past competitions, geometry and trigonometry.
    • Instructor: Professor Emeritus Edward Wang
  • Oct. 2: Algebra: identities and inequalities, polynomials.
  • Oct. 9: Fall Reading Week, no session.
  • Oct. 16: Real analysis: derivatives and integrals
  • Oct. 23: Algebra: Linear algebra, matrix operations, groups.
  • Oct. 30: Number theory: integer-valued sequences and functions, arithmetic, diophantine equations.
  • Nov. 6: Real analysis: limits and continuity.
  • Nov. 13: Sequences and series.
  • Nov. 20: Combinatorics: combinatorial arguments, binomial coefficients and counting methods.
    • Instructor: Professor Emeritus Edward Wang
  • Nov. 27: Real analysis: multivariable differential and integral calculus, equations with functions as unknowns.
  • Dec. 1 (Saturday): Competition! In Room LH2064

Resources

Putnam at Other Places (and Other Times)

Please report any broken links to shu@wlu.ca.