SPS Mathematics Blog

It was another successful year for the students who qualified for the British Mathematical Olympiad Round 1 (BMO1). Of the 85 students who took part, 35 received merits, 25 received distinctions, and 7 students qualified for BMO2. Having 7 students qualify for BMO2 is a fantastic achievement, especially given that only around 100–120 students nationwide reach this stage each year. This is also the highest number of merits and distinctions the school has ever attained in BMO1. Well done to all the students who took part — your hard work is truly paying off! Here is a selection of questions from the six problems on the BMO1 2025 paper, courtesy of UKMT. The full paper and mark scheme are available here :

SPS held a maths partnership event with a variety of the partnership schools in the local area. The event included a series of UKMT Team Challenge problems where groups were composed of one student from each school. The event kicked off with a 10 question quick fire quiz, followed up by a maths crossword, called the crossnumber. The event finished with a unique maths relay, in which each group was split in half and the teams competed in finishing a 20 question quiz, where the questions had to be completed sequentially with one half doing odd numbered questions and the other half doing the even ones.  There were two competitions those with 3 team members and those with 4. The scores were very tight and so huge congratulations to the winning team in both category. The top team was outstanding, almost scoring almost full marks. Overall, it was a great day where everyone enjoyed themselves and had their fill of maths. - Shorta  

The final group stage match of this year’s Hans Woyda Competition took place against The London Oratory School at home. The remaining squad members of Ryan (4 th ), Misha (6 th ), Lucas (L8 th ) and Adavya (U8 th ) helped me arrange my classroom into the battle chevron formation, after which a tube delay on our opponent’s side offered up plenty of time for some warm-up questions. Luckily, we were due for an early start regardless, and as such we were still making good time after The London Oratory had managed to overcome the challenges of the Piccadilly line. With both teams settled into their seats we prepared to start the match that would determine whether or not we make it through to the main knockout competition next term or end up competing for one of the plates instead. We were off to a strong start on the starter questions, and although an order of magnitude slip and a challenging three-way HCF question prevented us from getting full marks, Ryan managed to best his opponent ...

  The talk “Behind the Scenes of Retirement Dreams” was given by Ms. French, a former teacher who became an actuary. She explained how actuaries use maths to help people plan for retirement and make sure pension schemes are fair and sustainable. Ms. French described different types of pensions, like Defined Benefit (DB) and Defined Contribution (DC), and showed how both employees and employers contribute to them. She also explained how actuaries calculate the value of future pension payments using interest rates and life expectancy. I found it really interesting how much maths and problem-solving goes into making sure people have enough money after they retire. Ms. French also shared how to get into actuarial science, mentioning online courses, podcasts, and professional exams. Her talk showed how a strong background in teaching and maths can lead to an exciting and meaningful career as an actuary. - Shlok

A match report by Yidong from Cloete house: The First Round & Semi Final : In the first round, Cloete knocked out Nilsson by 34 points to 26, despite the scores being tied with just four race questions left. Gilks narrowly edged out Harrison by 24 points to 22, a gap of just one question, whilst Langley and Blurton won against Stewart and Warner respectively. Cloete beat Langley 34-26 in a replay of the semi-final that had gone the other way last year, and Blurton were victorious against Gilks to seal their spot in the final. The Final : The usual buzz spread throughout the school on the day of the final, and a large queue had even formed outside room 220 before the match! Unfortunately, most filtered into Chess Club in room 221, but a large crowd of four people came to watch, nevertheless. The line-ups for the match were Aryan (4th), Yidong (5th), Lucien (6th), Ashok (L8th) and Terry (U8th) of Cloete House, against Blurton’s team of Haoming (4th), Aron (5th) Kevin (6th), Richard (...

At the end of last Friday 7 th   November, I met the second iteration of the SPS Hans Woyda team in the atrium as we prepared for the unusually short journey to our first away match of the season. Unfortunately this meant that there was barely any time for me to pester Haoming (4 th ), Ehan (6 th ), Andrew (L8 th ) and William (U8 th ) with warmup questions on the trip over, and before I had even managed to get through three sections’ worth we had arrived at Harrodian. After a brief walk through the site to the prepared classroom (during which I admitted, to my embarrassment, that after eight years at St Paul’s I had never stopped to wonder where the name of our neighbouring school comes from!) the team took their seats and the match got underway. Both teams had a strong start, getting three out of the first four questions correct, with a counting slip on our part made up for by a summation slip on theirs. The next four starter questions caused a few more problems on both sides, no...