PMC FAQ

What does pmc stand for?

It stands for Penn Math Contest.

When is it?

We are planning to hold the contest on April 19, 2025. This date has been confirmed.

Where is it?

The contest will be held both in-person and online. The in-person event will be held on the University of Pennsylvania campus, in the David Rittenhouse Laboratory.

Who may participate?

The contest is geared towards students from 9th to 12th grade in the US education system. However, younger students can also participate. For international students, 9th to 12th grade is approximately secondary education (See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondary_education). Please email us regarding eligibility if there may be any questions.

How many students will be allowed to participate?

We are limiting the in-person and online contests to 300 students each.

What is the structure of the competition?

There will be a Beginners contest, an Intermediate and an Advanced contest. All levels of difficulty have a corresponding individual round (in the morning) and team round (in the afternoon). Teams can be up to 3 and will have the students working together. You can participate either in-person or online.

What level of math will the contest involve?

We will have three levels of competition: beginner, intermediate, and advanced. Beginner is aimed at students competing in a math contest for the first time, or with little-to-no prior experience, mirroring the MATHCOUNTS level. Intermediate is the average difficulty level for most participants, mirroring the AMC 10/12 level. Advanced level is for experienced competitors, who want more of a challenge.

The tests may involve results from Algebra I/II, Geometry, Probability, Beginning Logic, Beginning Number Theory, and Beginning Combinatorics (although the Beginner test will assume less content knowledge than the Intermediate and Advanced tests). One can refer to this document (https://web.evanchen.cc/handouts/Syllabus/Syllabus.pdf) by Evan Chen to get an idea of potential topics, although it is not exhaustive. We recommend you to check out our past PMC contests in the exam archive section to get a general idea of what topics we include in our contests.

Even if you feel like you don't have enough knowledge to complete the contest successfully, we encourage every student to give it a try no matter their mathematical background—you never know how you'll do until you try it! We'll release all problem solutions after the contest so that no matter your level, it'll be a learning experience for everyone.

How do I know what contest level to participate in?

We have released a selected set of example problems that we believe accurately captures the estimated difficulty of each level. Please feel free to refer to the document linked below.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1gD6qsG2gsNzWVlQVz0K3WKPe0Ozm-J_4/view?usp=sharing 

How can I Prepare for the contest?

Please check out our past PMC contests in the exam archive section to get a general idea of how the questions will look like. 

What will the itinerary for the day look like?

The itinerary looks the same for both levels of competition. All of the times are expressed in Eastern Standard Time, so make sure to convert all of the times to your local time zone!

• 9:30 AM: Check-in and arrival starts for the in-person contestants

• 10:00 AM: Opening ceremony starts for the in-person contestants

• 10:30 AM–12:00 PM: Individual round*

• 12:00 PM–1:30 PM: Lunch provided for the in-person contestants

• 2:00 PM–3:30 PM: Team round*

• 3:30 PM-5:30 PM: Events

• 5:30 PM: Award ceremony begins for the in-person contestants

*Event available both in-person and over Zoom. The award ceremony for the online contest will be released over email shortly after the contest ends.

What are the rules for the contest?

1. You are only allowed to use writing utensils, blank scratch paper, and (optionally) a ruler and compass. Do not use any devices that would give you an unfair advantage, such as calculators, computers, protractors, or phones.

2. You are not allowed to consult outside sources such as the Internet or other people while you participate in the contest. The only exception is that for the team rounds, you are permitted to talk and collaborate, but only with members of your team.

3. While you are participating in the contest online, your camera should be turned on to allow our proctors to monitor potential cheating. Both your face and your work surface should be visible at all times.

4. All questions are worth the same amount of points. If you get stuck on a question, feel free to skip it and move on to the next question!

5. In the case of a tie, certain problems have been designated as tiebreaker questions. Those problems are denoted by a star next to the problem number. If two students tie, whoever solved the most tiebreaker questions will place higher.

6. The top five individual students in the in-person contest will get medals, and the top three individual students in the in-person contest will get a book prize! The top three individual students and the top team in each category (either in-person or online) will also get a virtual certificate.

7. If there end up being cases which we haven’t thought of and are not addressed by the rules, we will use our best common sense and judgment to sort the situation out. We will try to be as fair as possible.