<p>Has anybody been to this seminar? Is it worth going?</p>
<p>Nobody? 10 char</p>
<p>I googled this and the first result was this very page.</p>
<p>^That’s true but your point is not very useful.</p>
<p>I’m not going (wasn’t invited either). I’m not sure if its worth going because I’ve never heard about it and I wasn’t able to find any information on it online. That might be a sign that it’s not worth going to.</p>
<p>^Idk…It’s hosted by Waterloo math department, and the department gives out pretty generous stipend.</p>
<p>Hi, I went in my grade 11 year in 2008. It’s usually just called the UWaterloo Math (Competition) Seminar. It’s pretty awesome and fun. It’s a bit of a recruitment by Waterloo, that’s why gr.12’s are not usually invited unless they’re on the IMO team or close to that point to replace IMO members who couldn’t come. Most of the invited non-imo kids are typically not best at math, but it’s a really good experience. (A strange thing is that quite of few of the kids who attended seminar ended up going to ivies or other good univs, but it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re good at math or because they attended the seminar; I guess it means that smart kids get invited.)</p>
<p>^Oh yeah I am not a typical math student but I strangely got a perfect in Hypatia this year so I guess that’s the reason why I got invited. Could you talk about the experience in a bit more details?</p>
<p>Let’s see… there are some lectures (e.g. graph theory, cryptography) and there are problem solving sessions. The students are split into 6 groups, each with a leader who’s an IMO team member or close. They kind of compete in the problem-solving session. The students are also split into 3 levels: A, B, and C based on their contest performance, and they attend different lectures I think and do the more difficult problems. We also went to the CMC banquet (good food) near the end to congratulate the contest winners. I feel that math was kind of secondary at the seminar and the more important things were to have fun and hang out with your peers (if you’ve heard of something called the Winter Camp, you’ll know what I mean). Every night there’s usually a different social activity, such as Movie Night and Karaoke. So I really recommend you go and enjoy! P.S. try to have your school pay for the cost.</p>
<p>^My school has already agreed to pay for me!</p>
<p>It’s just so nice to have teachers who actually congratulated you even though they paid. :D</p>
<p>@happysunnyshine I’m going to the seminar as well for my perfect in Fermat… but the process of getting a check from my school was quite painful. But I remember on our invitation package it states that we have to reply by May 4th to reserve a spot and you were still contemplating about whether to attend or not just a couple days ago. Maybe students from Ontario get a later deadline… but I suggest you to contact the seminar staff.</p>
<p>@JakobCreutzfeldt Thank you for the information. They are indeed very helpful Now I’m even more looking forward to attending it. =)</p>
<p>@happysunnyshine Please ignore the stupid comment in my previous post… Now I realize that the results of Hypatia only came out about a week ago… there’s absolutely no way that your deadline is the same as mine.</p>
<p>^Yes my deadline is May 28th.
Congratulation on your Fermat result! I did absolutely horrible on that exam. :p</p>
<p>I will see you in a couple of weeks!</p>