The initiative has been developed since 2012 and is sponsored by the Vice-Rector's Office for Research and Postgraduate Studies of the University of La Serena and by the Integrated Management Unit of Pedagogies (UGIP).

Last Saturday, July 28, the first event of the Pre-University and Vocational Mathematics Conference of the University of La Serena (JOMAT ULS 2018) culminated, an event that included the participation of eighth-grade students from eleven educational establishments in the regions of Coquimbo and Atacama.

The activity began in the morning with a cycle of workshops, in which the schools had the opportunity to prepare with exercises that covered various contents of the future tests they faced in the competition. The work was led by the team of volunteer students from the ULS, who assumed the role of monitors and tutors.

Then, the different stages of the Mathematics Olympiad took place in a very close manner, with the winners being Colegio Santa Teresa de Illapel (1st place) with 159 points, Liceo Santa Marta de Vallenar (2nd place) with 158 points, and the Andrés Bello Pampa School in La Serena (3rd place) with 153 points.

The student Milena Catalán, from the school that won first place, stated that “this achievement means tremendous happiness, and I am very happy that the same young people from the University managed to do this. At first we trained every Thursday afternoon, and every day of the last two weeks we carried out very complex rehearsals, so now we are very happy.”

The Mathematics teacher at Colegio Santa Teresa, Angelo Araya, expressed it in the same way, who accompanied his students at all times. “I am proud and very excited about the children who came to represent the establishment today. We had two weeks of preparation and we practiced not only the intellectual part, but also the emotional part, which is very important for them,” he said.

Student Francisca Cortés, who represented the Santa Marta de Vallenar school, had a similar feeling. “It is the first time we participate and we are competing with very high-level schools, which is why I feel very proud. It is nice that the University does this type of activities, because it gives us children who really like Mathematics the space and it is a nice experience,” she stated. Likewise, her classmate Sebastián Bustillos indicated that “it gave those of us who like Mathematics the opportunity to show what we know and to be able to compete and share our skills with others.”

For the student Catalina Barraza, from the Andrés Bello Pampa School, the initiative allowed her to “learn more, because there are contents that have not yet been passed on to us and that can be useful for later. It also serves as a good experience for life. “The competitions and the opportunity to meet people from other schools caught my attention.” This is confirmed by her colleague Rafaela Casas, who pointed out that “this activity has been very good, because you can meet other colleagues and you can challenge yourself. The fact that they separated us and mixed us in the workshops allowed us to socialize and get to know each other better.”

According to the organizer of this activity, Professor Diego Contreras, academic of the Department of Mathematics and in charge of the “Student Attraction, Retention and Accompaniment” subunit of the Integrated Management of Pedagogies Unit (UGIP), “the success of this version summarizes all the months of work and the effort put in by all the members of the volunteer team of the Pedagogy in Mathematics and Computing, Ped. in Mathematics and Physics, and Ped. in Biology and Natural Sciences, who participated on this occasion.” Likewise, he again thanked the participating establishments for their trust and invited them to continue joining in the following years in the different activities of the JOMAT ULS program.

Finally, the Director of the Mathematics Department of the ULS, Dr. Marco Corgini, valued the organization of this type of initiatives that have been developed since 2012, which responds year after year to the interest of bringing Mathematics and science closer together in a didactic way. to different generations of schoolchildren.

It should be noted that the winning establishments were joined by the important participation of the schools Altos del Cerro Grande, Sagrados Corazones (home of the Olympics), San Antonio, Calasanz, María de Andacollo, Miguel de Cervantes, Tulahuén de Monte Border Concentration School Homeland and Teresa Cannon School of Barroileth de Los Vilos.

Source: PMI FIP ULS1501