Register for the Putnam Competition

Sept. 21, 2016
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This year's William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition will be on Saturday, Dec. 2, 2017.

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 Thursday, 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, you will need to fill out the Putnam Training Session Registration Form. This form will be available soon.

Schedule

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

The sessions will start on Tuesday, Sept. 26, 2017, and the last session is on Tuesday, Nov. 28, 2017. There is no session on Oct. 10, 2017 due to the reading week.

If a student is interested in participating in the training sessions, s/he should send email to shu@wlu.ca or pzhang@wlu.ca by NOON on Tues. Sept. 19, 2017.

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. 26: Introduction, problems from past competitions, geometry and trigonometry.
    • Instructor: TBA
  • Oct. 3: Algebra: identities and inequalities, polynomials.
  • Oct. 10: Fall Reading Week, no session.
    • Instructor: TBA
  • Oct. 17: Sequences and series.
    • Instructor: TBA
  • Oct. 24: Algebra: Linear algebra, matrix operations.
    • Instructor: TBA
  • Oct. 31: Number theory: integer-valued sequences and functions, arithmetic, diophantine equations.
    • Instructor: TBA
  • Nov. 7: Real analysis: limits and continuity.
    • Instructor: TBA
  • Nov. 14: Real analysis: derivatives and integrals.
    • Instructor: TBA
  • Nov. 21: Combinatorics: combinatorial arguments, binomial coefficients and counting methods.
    • Instructor: TBA
  • Nov. 28: Real analysis: multivariable differential and integral calculus, equations with functions as unknowns.
    • Instructor: TBA
  • Dec. 2 (Saturday): Competition! In Room LH3058

Resources

Putnam at Other Places (and Other Times)

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