Jiang Ping, a 17-year-old student majoring in fashion design from Jiangsu Lianshui Secondary Vocational School, entered the final of the 2024 Alibaba Global Math Contest together with contestants from Peking University, Tsinghua University, MIT, Cambridge and other well-known universities, and was hailed as a "talented girl" by netizens.
Jiang Ping. Pictures provided by the competition organizer
On June 14, Li Ming (a pseudonym), a doctoral student majoring in mathematics from a 985 university who also qualified for the final, told Pengpai News (www.thepaper.cn) that the top 50 candidates in the preliminary contest must have strong mathematical ability. "The full score of the preliminary contest is 120 points, and the girl can get 93 points, which means that the last five major questions may be done more than 3.5 correctly. I think it is very powerful, and it is a miracle."
The "Ali Math Contest" is held once a year. Since 2017, it has been sponsored by Alibaba Public Welfare and Alibaba Dharma Institute. It is open to fans of all ages, backgrounds and professions. It aims to stimulate broad social interest in mathematics and encourage learning mathematics to promote the development of digital technology. According to the official website, tens of thousands of people from dozens of countries and regions representing more than 100 universities participate in the competition every year. This year's qualifier will be held from 8:00 on April 13 to 8:00 on April 15. The contestants can submit their answers within 48 hours. The questions include multiple choice questions, answer questions, and proof questions. Access to information and the use of programming software are allowed, but discussion with others, external dissemination of contest questions, and all forms of cheating are prohibited.
Li Ming told the surging news that he also participated in the competition last year and reached the final. This year is the second time to participate in the competition, which is slightly more difficult than last year.
"There will be a score line in the preliminaries. The score line this year is 45 points for those who have passed the preliminaries." He said that the preliminaries' questions are very flexible and can be roughly divided into three categories: combining with real life, the difficulty and examination form are equivalent to the more difficult and flexible questions in the first two years of the undergraduate examinations of the Department of Mathematics, and the questions related to mathematical academic papers - their solutions may come from papers, "In general, most of the knowledge points involved in the preliminaries were within the first two years of the undergraduate course of the mathematics department, but the difficulty and professionalism of the finals were stronger, probably the level of graduate students in the mathematics department, and many of them were related to academic research topics in the mathematics field."
"As far as I know, most of the contestants who have reached the finals are undergraduates, masters and doctoral students from well-known universities, while the contestants in high schools and previous stages are basically from the top middle schools all over the country, such as Shanghai Middle School, Shenzhen Middle School, Hangzhou Xuejun Middle School, and they are all top-notch students in mathematics who have invested a lot of time and energy in learning, such as contestants," Li Ming said, To be fair, for outstanding undergraduates and postgraduates from top universities in the world, they put their energy into answering questions carefully within 48 hours, and the difficulty of promotion is "not particularly great".
"Although the preliminaries are open book, I think the top 50 must have very strong mathematical ability or 'very talented'." Li Ming told the surging news that the full score of the preliminaries was 120 points, with 3 multiple-choice questions being 10 points, 5 points and 5 points respectively, and 5 major questions (answer questions and proof questions), each with 20 points. Each major question has several small questions. "Jiang Ping scored 93 points in the exam. Assuming that all her multiple choice questions were right, I guess she might have done 3.5 correct big questions, which is very powerful." He said that the difficulty of the big questions was uneven, and she did 2.5 right. One question that she didn't do was related to an academic paper. "If you haven't read the paper, it's hard to have a good idea."
Jiang Ping. Pictures provided by the competition organizer
Jiang Ping came into contact with advanced mathematics after entering the technical secondary school, and benefited from the guidance of mathematics teacher Wang Runqiu. Wang Runqiu also participated in the "Ali Math Contest" this year, and advanced to the 125th place.
Wang Runqiu (right). WeChat official account of "Jiangsu University"
According to the official WeChat official account of Jiangsu University on the 14th, Wang Runqiu is a master's degree graduate of mathematics major in Jiangsu University in 2020. He studied under Professor Lu Dianchen of the School of Mathematical Sciences and remained committed to mathematical research after graduation from Lianshui Secondary Vocational School. He participated in the "Ali Math Contest" in 2022 and 2023, both of which reached the finals. Professor Lu Dianchen said that Wang Runqiu worked very hard in his studies. "His master's project is a very difficult open question, and it is not easy to make achievements." Chen Yue, Wang Runqiu's classmate and teacher of the School of Mathematics and Science of Jiangsu University, said that she felt Jiang Ping's speaking style was very similar to Wang Runqiu when she saw the relevant reports, "Younger martial brothers are willing to study difficult problems. They often show their ideas and argumentation process in the circle of friends, whether during school or after work."
The final of the "Ali Math Contest" will be held from 0:00 to 24:00 on the 22nd, in a closed book format. Players can choose any 8 consecutive hours during the window period to answer.
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