Putnam Mathematical Competition

William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition

The William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition, often abbreviated to Putnam Competition, is an annual mathematics competition for undergraduate college students enrolled at institutions of higher learning in the United States and Canada (regardless of the students’ nationalities). It awards a scholarship and cash prizes ranging from $250 to $2,500 for the top students and $5,000 to $25,000 for the top schools, plus one of the top five individual scorers (designated as Putnam Fellows) is awarded a scholarship of up to $12,000 plus tuition at Harvard University (Putnam Fellow Prize Fellowship), the top 100 individual scorers have their names mentioned in the American Mathematical Monthly (alphabetically ordered within rank), and the names and addresses of the top 500 contestants are mailed to all participating institutions. It is widely considered to be the most prestigious university-level mathematics competition in the world, and its difficulty is such that the median score is often zero (out of 120) despite being attempted by students specializing in mathematics.

• The competition consists of two 3-hour sessions, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. During each session, participants work individually on 6 challenging mathematical problems.

• The competition was founded in 1927 by Elizabeth Lowell Putnam in memory of her husband William Lowell Putnam, who was an advocate of intercollegiate intellectual competition. The competition has been offered annually since 1938 and is administered by the Mathematical Association of America.

• The Putnam began in 1938 as a competition between mathematics departments at colleges and universities. Now the competition has grown to be the leading university-level mathematics examination in the world. Although participants work independently on the problems, there is a team aspect to the competition as well. Prizes are awarded to the participants with the highest scores and to the departments of mathematics of the five institutions, the sum of whose top three scores is the greatest.

From The Team

Epsilon-Delta Mathematics Circle has totally focused on finding and nurturing the best mathematical talents in India and worldwide. Our research program in advanced mathematics is aimed at nurturing mathematical talents beyond any restrictions or bounds of the syllabus, so that we can nurture students wanting to learn without any limit. Branches that are exclusively available only at the universities are studied, as well as the problem-solving skills required for advanced research. This greatly aids students’ performance in PutNum.