Rhode Island MathCounts

Due to its small size, Rhode Island has no chapters. Instead, students progress straight to the state competition from their schools. The state competition is generally held on the first Saturday of March at the Community College of Rhode Island (CCRI), Warwick.

A normal state competition consists of the Sprint round, followed by a break for muffins/donuts, etc., then the Target round, which is followed by lunch. After lunch, the team round takes place, and then there is a brief waiting period until the countdown round competitors are announced. After the countdown round the awards ceremony takes place, and the top 6 teams and their coaches, the top 4 in the countdown round, and the top 4 on the written competition are recognized and presented with trophies.

State Team Determination Method

Rhode Island has no official Countdown round. Instead, the top four is based purely on written scores. The top 8 compete in an unofficial Countdown round where the first round consists of:

8 vs. 1

7 vs. 2

6 vs. 3

5 vs. 4

The winners progress to a second round, and the losers are eliminated. In this second round, the losers of each of the 2 pairings go against each other for places 3 and 4, and the winners go against each other for places 1 and 2.

Nationals Placements

The Rhode Island MathCounts team achievd its highest place ever at nationals in 2010, when it was the 30th place team. In 2011, it was 45th place team. The team frequently places in the 40s-50s.