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WORLD FEDERATION OF NATIONAL MATHEMATICS COMPETITIONS

WFNMC-6 Riga, Latvia, July 2010

Dates: The congress will start on 25th July, Sunday (arrival) and end on 31st July, Saturday (departure).

Immediately after the congress the 6th conference Creativity in math education and education of gifted children will start (1st August, Sunday, will be the arrival day). So it will be easy to attend both meetings.

Fees: not yet known.

WORK BEFORE CONFERENCE

We will ask each participant to submit theses up to one A4 page. An international program committee will review them. In the case of acceptance the author(s) will be asked to submit a full paper. The length of the paper will depend on the decision of IPC.

We will ask each participant to submit 3 or so competition problems (before the conference, but possibly later than thesis) together with explanation WHY these problems seem interesting/valuable to him/her. A special problem book committee will consider them and prepare for joint work during the congress.

APPROXIMATE SCHEDULE

From Monday until Friday there will be four working days and one excursion day (this excursion will be on bus and take at least 5-6 hours). At the morning of each working day we will work in sections, including the work on the problems sent in by the participants (or brought by them directly to the congress). So we will prepare a draft version of the problem book with extended comments, which will be published after editing ( as one of the hard outcomes of the congress ).

After lunch there will be two plenary lectures. They will consider both competition issues (we propose one plenary lecture for each area, see later) and general mathematical topics. After a middle-length break mini - conferences will take place. We propose four areas in which they and the sections will be organized:

1. a bridge between research mathematics ( theoretical computer science ) and competitions,
2. competition problems and general methods of their solution,
3. types and organization of the competitions,
4. preparation of students and teachers.

We see broad areas where the suggestions of people from computer science could be valuable and thought-provoking, e.g,. can we use problems whose solutions employ databases? Maybe the fifth area algorithmics along with algebra, geometry, combinatorics and number theory should be introduced? etc.

More specifications will come when the proposals of the eventual participants will start to arrive.

SOCIAL ACTIVITY

On each evening there will be some social event, e.g., opening banquet, closing banquet, concert, excursion through old Riga possibly combined with a travel on a ship in Daugava, etc.

ADDITIONAL ACTIVITIES

They will include exhibitions (one of them will be the exhibition of mathematical toys).

The International Mathematics Tournament of Towns Meeting, meetings of WFNMC etc. will be scheduled.

Venue: University of Latvia.

Climate: 20 to 25 deg, mainly sunny, sea temp about 17 deg.