Putnam Team
The Mathematics Department's Putnam Exam team is coached by faculty and is currently ranked 24th of 546 schools in the United States and Canada.
By Lauren Flores
BYU’s math team placed 24th of 546 schools in the United States and Canada in the annual William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition.
Peter Barratta, a freshman from Belmont, Mass., majoring in mathematics, was the team’s highest scorer, placing 134th of 4,036 individuals.
“We’ve had a good team for a while and that’s partly because we’ve had excellent coaches who train them in problem solving,” said Tyler Jarvis, Math Department chair. “And we’ve also tried to recruit good students.”
The United States of America Mathematical Olympiad is a competition where colleges are able to scope out promising high school students.
“We go to things like that and look at those students’ scores and try to recruit them to come to BYU — sort of like the football team would,” Jarvis said.
Baratta was recruited by the Mathematics Department and is currently on scholarship at BYU.
“I’ve been doing math my entire life,” he said.
BYU hosts a competition in the fall similar to the Putnam Exam. This year, BYU invited the University of Utah to participate.
The high scorers from the competition are selected to be on the BYU team.
Teams for the Putnam Competition are comprised of three students who spend a total of six hours working on problems.
Jarvis said part of the pull for students to come to BYU are the mentored research opportunities available to undergraduates.
The National Science Foundation awarded BYU a grant to teach other universities how to do mentored research.
“If the students go to some big name places like Harvard, they’re going to be taught by graduate TAs and never really talk to professors as much as undergraduates,” Jarvis said. “It’ll be really unlikely they’ll be able to do any research with any professors.”
Jarvis said there is room for the team to grow and improve.
“We’re learning about how to do better in these contests and we’ve got an excellent coach and promising new recruits,” he said.
