Comments

haven't even dared look at them yet -- I'm afraid I'll be lost for days.

Hah!

The rest of us are afraid we'll be depressed for days!

-- CatherineJohnson - 22 Jul 2005

Here they are, for those who drilled down this far:

These are seriously challenging problems.

-- CarolynJohnston - 22 Jul 2005

These are seriously over my head!

-- CatherineJohnson - 22 Jul 2005

What kind of math is this?

I'm assuming the first problem is geometry, but is the second what you & Barry have been calling 'combinatorials'?

-- CatherineJohnson - 22 Jul 2005

Or is it algebra?

-- CatherineJohnson - 22 Jul 2005

Or what??

-- CatherineJohnson - 22 Jul 2005

The second one is algebra, and the third one is the kind of thing you'd do in real analysis.

Assuming that it's possible to do them at all, they're about on the level of challenging early-grad-school assignments.I wonder what high schoolers can do them?

There's a similar sort of exam for undergraduates called the Putnam exam that I've been meaning to find some examples from.

-- CarolynJohnston - 22 Jul 2005

Oh wait--I meant the third one!

So the third one is....real analysis.

I didn't notice the 2nd one.

I think I would have guessed algebra for that one.

-- CatherineJohnson - 22 Jul 2005

Isn't the Putnam also a huge math competition?

(Or am I thinking of the Fields???)

-- CatherineJohnson - 22 Jul 2005

The Fields is like the Nobel for mathematicians -- the catch being that you have to be under 40 to win it! Talk about a young person's game.

The Putnam is a big math competition for extremely good undergraduate math majors.

-- CarolynJohnston - 22 Jul 2005