Tiny but Mighty GSES Mathletes

For the first time in the school’s history, students from Good Shepherd Episcopal School competed in the Virginia Math League. Although Good Shepherd is a small K-8 school located in the heart of Forest Hill, students are inspired to compete against schools with much larger populations and resources. Good Shepherd is the smallest school in the Richmond area to participate in the competition.

Ten of the school’s 16 sixth-grade students voluntarily competed against their local peers in this year’s Math League competition. Students competed on Tuesday, February 25, by completing a variety of word problems in a thirty-minute period. These sixth graders have been preparing for the competition at bi-weekly practices after school and during lunch for the last six weeks.

Team sponsor Nancy Negus said, “These students have devoted so much time to getting ready and have shown tremendous perseverance to this new school activity. The contest is very challenging. Not only are the questions difficult, students have only 30 minutes to answer as many questions as they can. The fact that the test is timed can be stressful in itself. I was pleased that so many students wanted to participate.”

While the final results aren’t in, Good Shepherd students definitely won in terms of heart and experience. Mrs. Negus concluded, “I’m happy that our students now have the experience of preparing for and participating in a nationwide competition. We celebrated our hard work and math success with a party for the entire sixth grade!”