It’s Saturday, June 3rd, 2023. My alarm blares at 5:45 AM, jolting my roommate and me awake. I look around confused for a second, before the realization hits me: today is the day. Today is ARML.
Because I am 95% confident that you don’t know what ARML is, I’ll give you a brief rundown. ARML stands for the “American Regions Mathematics League”, and it is an annual national competition held in four different locations in the first week of June. This year, I qualified for Maine Team “B1” (the other team being “B2”), and I was honored to be part of a group of 25 of the brightest high school mathematicians in the state who traveled down to Penn State over the weekend (we should have had two teams of 15 people, but there were some last minute drops that lead the “B2” team to have only 10).
The individual portion of ARML is known as being notoriously difficult, especially in terms of timing. The problems themselves are challenging even with a solid math background, but it’s almost impossible to get all of them right with the strict timing. The questions come in five sets of two, and you get 10 minutes per set. This means you have 5 minutes to finish each problem, each of which requires a significant amount of thinking AND computation. In short, the test is very challenging.
This year, the best score from Maine was a 4 out of 10 correct. About five others got 3 out of 10 correct, and then a good portion of us got 2 correct. I was one of those people.
So, that’s the story of how Sebastien Martínez got a 20% on a test. Am I upset? Normally, I would be. But with ARML, it’s just the opposite. I feel great. I performed well when compared to the other scores from Maine, and so my takeaway is not one of defeat, but it’s more than that. I am happy with how it went.
The Maine team didn’t just travel down to Penn State to sit down and take a test. We went to different restaurants in the Penn State area. We slept in dorms that somewhat gave off prison vibes to give us a taste of what college will be like. We went and enjoyed ice cream at the famous “Berkey Creamery”. Through all of this, we formed a community of like-minded individuals who love math, problem-solving, and learning with friends.
We are the thinkers of the future. We are the innovators of the future. We are the leaders of the future. And you are too.
If you are interested in learning like I am, you should seriously consider joining an academic club at the high school. I lead the Math Team, Quiz/Science Bowl, and Speech and Debate, so I have a vested interest in promoting membership in those teams. But I know that any form of academic pursuit outside of the classroom is good for you, the school, and the community at large. So if those three clubs aren’t right for you, go join Model UN. Go join Robotics. Heck, start your own club! Just promise me this: never stop learning, and never give up on yourself or your peers.
– Sebastien
Math Team classroom code: ug24uer
Quiz/Science Bowl classroom code: ictctbi
Speech and Debate classroom code: 6csui7g