On December 3, 2011, three Southwestern students from Dr. Alison Marr’s Putnam Power Hour class participated in the 72nd William Lowell Putnam Mathematics Competition. The Putnam Competition involves a 6 hour exam in which the students attempt to solve 12 challenging math problems. Each problem is worth 10 points. This year 4440 students took the Putnam exam with a median score of 1. David Vaden, sophomore math/music double major, scored an 11 and placed 646th. Zachary Anglin, junior math major, scored a 2 placing him 1316th. Alain Chau, sophomore math major, also took the exam and the Putnam Power Hour class.

In addition, schools can also compete as a team by pre-selecting three students’ scores to add together to form a team score. This year 460 institutions across North America submitted teams and only the top 150 teams are ranked. Due to the great individual scores of our team members, Southwestern’s team placed 149th. Congrats to David, Zach, and Alain for all their hard work!