PHL team wins medals at Int’l Math Olympiad in UK

All six of the Philippines' delegates to the IMO won medals at the event. Photo: DOST

All the six members of the Philippine delegation won medals at the 60th International Math Olympiad (IMO) in Britain last month, the Department of Science and Technology (DOST) said.

“This is a huge victory for the country, knowing how difficult it is to get a medal
in the IMO. But we are more awed by the fact that most of the participants are first-timers and still managed to seize this incredible achievement,” DOST-Science Education Institute Director Josette Biyo said.

Contestants in the IMO have to individually solve "challenging and original" math problems and are awarded based on the scores they earned from their written solutions.

The Filipino students who won at the 60th IMO held at the University of Bath from July 11 to 22, 2019 were:

• Sean Anderson Ty of Zamboanga Chong Hua High School (silver)
• Andres Rico Gonzales III of De La Salle University Integrated School (bronze)
• Immanuel Josiah Balete of St. Stephen’s High School (bronze)
• Vincent Dela Cruz of Valenzuela City School of Mathematics and Science (bronze)
• Dion Stephan Ong of Ateneo de Manila Senior High School (bronze)
• Bryce Ainsley Sanchez of Grace Christian College (bronze)

Except for Ty and Gonzales, all other Filipino delegates were first-timers to the IMO.

They came face to face with 600 other contestants from 107 countries around the globe. Each country may only send six representatives to the prestigious competition at most.

According to the DOST-SEI, this was the second time that all the Philippine delegates bagged medals from the contest. The first time this occurred was during the 58th IMO in 2017. — Dona Magsino/BM, GMA News