The Sum of Hard Work

The Marauder Mathletes Shine at a Statewide Competition

Photo by John Gussaroff

After securing first place at many regional competitions, Maclay Mu Alpha Theta (ΜΑΘ) traveled down to Orlando to attend the 2025 Florida Association of Mu Alpha Theta (FAMAT) State Convention. The event was held from April 4–6 at the Rosen Plaza Hotel. This year’s state team consisted of 16 students who had practiced around two hours per week for several months.

Accompanied by sponsors John Gussaroff, Lauren Fantle and Katie Walker, the Marauders departed from Maclay at 7 a.m. on Thursday, April 2 and spent the first day at Universal Studios Florida. At the hotel, students attended a brief meeting every night and had free time until 11 p.m.

The opening ceremony was held on the morning of April 4. The Marauders competed in ciphering, a team-style event done individually, at 1:30 p.m. and individual tests at 3:30 p.m. Maclay had students in all subject areas: Mu (calculus), Alpha (precalculus), Theta (algebra 2) and statistics. Later in the evening and on the next day, students took two topic tests, which had more specific subject areas.

On April 5, some Marauders participated in team tests and mini-events, relay and hustle. Relay required groups of three competitors—one from Mu, another from Alpha and the last from Theta—to sit in lines and use their teammates’ answers to solve their problems. Hustle provided groups of four students with a large stack of problems, and students had to solve as many of them as possible. After these competitions, the Marauders had free time in the pool and closed the night with the awards ceremony.

“I’m happy with how much everyone practiced this year and how much effort everyone put in,” senior Diya Patel said. “It’s kind of bittersweet to know it’s my last state trip in high school.”

Freshman Kai Okui placed eighth out of 76 competitors and first in the region in Alpha Trigonometry as well as 45th out of 230 students and second in the region in the Theta individual test; this was the best performance of any Maclay student since Maclay started attending state trips two years ago. Senior Landon Fantle and Patel each placed 120th (fifth in the region) and 146th (seventh in the region) out of 282 competitors in the Mu individual test. Senior Leah Song placed 30th out of 118 students and first in the region in Mu Integration, and senior Gavin Slocum placed 56th out of 134 students in Mu Limits and Derivatives.

“I thought I was not going to be able to achieve anything on the standings, but I was really surprised to see that I was able to get eighth on one of the topic tests,” Okui said. “It was so cool to compete and see all the other people.”

In the Theta division, freshman Colgan Dudley placed 108th out of 208 students and 8th in the region in the individual test. Dudley and freshman Luke Davidson each placed 34th out of 83 students (third in the region) and 44th out of 83 students (fifth in the region) in Alpha Equations and Inequalities. The team tests’ results included Mu of 24th out of 33 teams, Alpha of 21st out of 32 teams and Theta of 20th out of 20 teams.

“One of the big things we’re trying to do [next year] is catch more people early who are interested,” Gussaroff said. “This year we had more algebra 2 people that were really involved than we had in the past, so that’s a good sign for the future.”