Gardner-Webb University Students Excel at Regional Math Jeopardy Competition

Team Finishes Second at MAA Southeastern Sectional Meeting; Junior Timothy Campbell Wins Presentation Prize

BOILING SPRINGS, N.C.—Months of preparation, quick thinking and teamwork propelled the Gardner‑Webb University Math Jeopardy team to a second‑place finish at a competition held recently during the Southeastern Sectional Meeting of the Mathematical Association of America. Competing against 26 teams, the students marked the strongest finish a GWU team has ever achieved in the competition.

The meeting was held at the University of North Alabama in Florence. The students, Timothy Campbell, Abby Mace and Mark Watt, competed under the guidance of coaches Dr. Mirek Mystkowski and Dr. Olga Poliakova from the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science. The trio advanced to the Final Four and finished just one question shy of winning the championship.

“We had a very experienced team this year,” noted Poliakova, professor of mathematics. “It was the third competition for Timothy Campbell and Abby Mace, and the second competition for Mark Watt.”

The Math Jeopardy Competition is a staple of the MAA Southeastern Conference and follows a format modeled after the “Jeopardy!” game show. “Each game features four teams, and there are 30 questions in six categories worth between 200 and 1,000 points,” described Mystkowski, professor of mathematics and computer science. “The questions are varied, all of them are related to math but there are also categories about math in popular culture or similar.”

This year’s competition featured three rounds, beginning with preliminary games and culminating in a Final Four showdown. Gardner-Webb competed against Georgia College, Christian Brothers University and Belmont University.

Mystkowski said, “GWU won both the first and second round game. We actually had the best score overall in the second round which gave us the right to choose the first question in the final game.”

Preparation for the competition began months earlier through Math Club practices. “Math Jeopardy Competition is held in the spring, so we start preparing in the fall,” Poliakova said. “In preparation for the competition, we hold Math Jeopardy practices at the Math Club meetings. Dr. Mystkowski and I use questions of various degrees of difficulty and in several areas of mathematics to keep practice sessions engaging.”

Those practices helped sharpen both speed and accuracy. “Students practice solving problems correctly and fast,” Poliakova said. “Also, at the competition, some questions may require general knowledge or are about mathematics in pop culture, so having well‑rounded team members helps quite a bit.”

Campbell, of Shelby, N.C., a junior biology major with chemistry and mathematics minors, is Math Club president. He said the event’s structure favors experience. The team’s strategy relied heavily on collaboration. “For long problems—especially the Daily Double and Final Jeopardy, we tried to have all three of us work through the problem, so that we could check our answers against each other,” Campbell related.

Despite narrowly missing first place, the team’s accomplishment was significant, as it was the only team to reach the Final Four with just three members and was the sole finalist with one mathematics major. Campbell said he enjoyed the fast‑paced challenge of math competitions and the opportunity to solve problems under pressure. He added, “I think the department does a very good job of exposing students to interesting problems, and our advisors encourage us to participate and to become faster at computing answers to more involved problems.”

Senior Mark Watt, of Ellenboro, N.C., a mathematics major and Math Club treasurer, stated that the team’s strategy emerged as the competition progressed. “Whenever we could, we would work independently on the same problem to confirm each other’s results,” he explained. “We also had our individual strengths: one of us knew linear algebra, another was better at speedy arithmetic, etc. When point-bets occurred, we would compute the minimum number of points we would need to wager in order to guarantee a lead or at least a catch-up on our closest competitor.”

He described the event as both challenging and rewarding. Reflecting on the final round, Watt acknowledged how close the team came. “We were one question away from becoming the champions of this year,” he said. “That said, second place is nothing to sneeze at, especially considering how hard we worked in the stages leading up to the finale.”

Watt added that the experience reinforced the value of faculty support. “The faculty in the GWU Department of Mathematical and Computer Sciences were very supportive of our trip, and celebrated with us when they learned of our victory in the competition,” he said.

Junior Abby Mace, of Blacksburg, S.C., a psychology and biology double major with a mathematics minor, is vice president of the Math Club. She also pointed out that experience played a key role. “This was the third year I competed, so I knew what to expect,” she said. “I used to compete in competitive trivia, so I think the competition is fun.”

In addition to the team’s success, Campbell was individually recognized with the Walt and Susan Patterson Prize for his presentation, “When Data Breaks the Formula: Problems for Rarefaction Curve Calculations,” at the same conference. The Patterson Prize was established in 2006 to encourage undergraduates to participate in the annual meetings and recognize their scholarship.

“My presentation was about calculating a rarefaction curve, which approximates how many species within a specified group will be found given a specified sample size, from samples of a marine fossil layer found around Myrtle Beach to Wilmington and inland from there,” Campbell summarized. “These samples turn out not to fit the two possible expected curves, so I tried using proportional abundances of species from a 2-liter sample to narrow down the possible functions.”

Campbell’s study was related to research that he has conducted for several years alongside his father, Dr. David Campbell, GWU professor of paleontology, and his grandfather. “I enjoy presenting on my own research, as something that I think others may be interested to hear about,” he affirmed. “I was grateful at winning the prize, and it demonstrated to me that I could explain these topics well to a different audience from those I am most used to.”

Gardner-Webb University is North Carolina’s recognized leader in private, Christian higher education. A Carnegie-Classified Doctoral/Professional University, GWU is home to nine colleges and schools, more than 80 undergraduate and graduate majors, and a world-class faculty. Located on a beautiful 225-acre campus in Boiling Springs, N.C., Gardner-Webb prepares graduates to impact their chosen professions, equips them with the skills to advance the frontiers of knowledge, and inspires them to make a positive and lasting difference in the lives of others. Become More at gardner-webb.edu.