It took Daesun Yim of West Windsor just a small fraction of the allotted 45 seconds to answer the challenging math problem that led to his victory at the national Mathcounts competition in Alexandria, Virginia, on May 11 and 12. Yim, 14, an eighth grade student at Community Middle School, competed against 227 other middle school students and won the contest in the intense one-on-one oral countdown round where 12 mathletes competed.
The winning question was:
A jar contains 8 red balls, 6 green balls and 24 yellow balls. In order to make the probability of choosing a yellow ball from the jar on the first selection equal to 1/2, Kerry will add x red balls and y green balls. What is the average of x and y?
The answer is five.
Mathcounts competitions are held in middle schools in the 50 states, other United States Territories, and the Department of Defense and State Department schools worldwide, participated in the Lockheed Martin MATHCOUNTS National Competition. More than 500,”000 students participated at the entry level. See www.mathcounts.org.
Yim was part of the New Jersey team including Grover Middle School students Michael Wu and Ming-Ming Tran, and Dennis Lu from W.R. Satz School in Holmdel. Their coach was Marie Siller of Montgomery Middle School in Skillman.
In the state competition, Community Middle School took second place and Grover, third place. Individual standings included Yim, first place; Wu, second place, and Tran in third place. Alyce Doehner, a math teacher at Grover Middle School, coached both teams through the regional and state competitions.
This was Yim’s third national competition. It is an extremely rare occurrence where a student makes the national team in sixth through eighth grades. He was recognized for the achievement at the awards ceremony.
His father, Chan Yim, received a doctorate in engineering from University of Maryland, and moved to West Windsor in 1987 to work for Environ in Carnegie Center. He now works for WA Cleary Chemical in Somerset. His mother, Kyunghee Yim, a former CPA, is a real estate agent with Keller Williams on Canal Pointe Boulevard. Daesun’s sister, Mia, 12, is in sixth grade at Community Middle School.
Both children were born in Princeton. The family lived in Dutch Neck Estates until two years ago when they moved to Dey Farms Road, also in West Windsor.
“He always enjoyed math and had a fascination with numbers,” says his mother. “When other kids were interested in toys, he was happy with toothpicks, chopsticks, magnets, and puzzles.”
According to his mother, Daesun was able to count to 21 when he was only a year old and by the time he was two he could not only count to 100 but already understood the concept of multiplication. “He wanted to go to school when he was two and attended the newly-opened Montessori Corners for a short time.”
“All parents think their children are gifted but I realized he was different when he was three,” said his mother. “We had a new computer with a world atlas and he memorized capital cities, as well as national flags and anthems.”
Even as a first-time mother Kyunghee Lee was aware of education systems and parent involvement. Her own parents were immigrants and she had represented them at PTA meetings when her younger brother was in school.
When Daesun later attended Dutch Neck Presbyterian Nursery School, his teacher (Mrs. Taylor) recognized his math abilities. After she asked him to multiply 36 by 37 and he knew the answer quickly, she spoke to the principal at Dutch Neck School.
“He was already reading,” says his mother. “We didn’t do IQ tests because we didn’t have to prove anything.”
“Dutch Neck School teacher Mrs. Martin told us that what he was doing was beyond sixth grade level.” When he was four and a half, testing by Michael Welborn (now principal at Wicoff School) revealed that he was beyond ninth grade level.
When Daesun was in first grade, he was given individual extra math classes by Charles Ashton, a math teacher at High School South. Daesun was also in the district’s gifted and talented program.
He has been taking math classes at High School North for four years and has already taken the AP calculus test. “I feel comfortable that he is going in the right direction,” his mother says. “I like to see kids feel good about themselves and behave in acceptable ways.”
The competition took place on Thursday and Friday, May 11 and 12. On Saturday, Daesun and his parents were flown to New York, and Daesun and his coach appeared on NBC’s Today Show on Sunday to promote the math program. They were flown back to Virginia where Daesun and other students visited President Bush in the Oval Office in the White House on Monday.
As part of his prize, Daesun will be attending Space Camp and Math Camp this summer. Another prize, a new computer, should arrive in the mail this week. He also received a large trophy and a medal to wear around his neck. Contest sponsors include National Society of Professional Engineers, National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, CNA Foundation, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon Company, Texas Instruments, General Motors Foundation, 3M Foundation, Northrop Grumman Foundation, and National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
“Scientists are realizing that we (the United States) are behind and that kids studying academics is important,” his mother said. “In this country a lot of newspaper coverage is sports and entertainment oriented and kids think you can make good money with a career in those fields.”
“In Korea those doing well in school get front page coverage and education is emphasized,” she says. “It is understood in Korea that everyone goes to college.”
“When Daesun was younger, he was happy as long as he was reading books, but we stressed social skills as well as understanding academics,” she says. “As a parent you have to help them be interested in other people with playdates and playgroups.”
“There are so many things out there for Daesun to consider and I don’t want to narrow his vision,” she says. Her son studies piano with Larissa Korkina and cello with Hou Lee (a student of Yo Yo Ma). Yim plays cello in the school orchestra.
“The effort that went into this level of competition is all due to his mother and teachers,” said his father. “The win, a tremendous joy for the family and the township, made it a great Mother’s Day weekend for everyone.” Observers at the competition included his parents, his sister, his maternal grandparents, and his fraternal grandfather.
“When I returned to school everyone congratulated me and asked how the president was,” Daesun said. “The Oval Office was a lot nicer than I thought it would be. I’d like to thank my coaches and everyone who made this possible.” His next goal is to compete in the National Math Olympiad.
