COURSE DESCRIPTION: The goal of this independent study is to field a team that finishes in the top 10 in the Putnam competition. To achieve this, we will meet and discuss numerous challenging problems from competitions around the world, concentrating on general strategies, types of problems, and the mathematics behind them. This will be an intense class, meeting at least once or twice a week during lucnh hours. All students will be required to solve problems, contribute during class discussions, take the Green Chicken exam and the Putnam competition.
Format: Tutorial. Evaluation will be based primarily on homework, presentations, and performance on competitions such as the Green Chicken and the Putnam..
Prerequisites: Permission of the instructor.

COURSE MECHANICS: We will meet at least twice a week, at least one lunch and at least one afternoon. The format of the course will be the following. We will frequently have a theme each week (the first week will be either Proofs by Induction or the Pidgeon-hole Principle). We will look at problems related to this theme; however, if you know that you are to use a certain technique, the problems become easier. Thus, we will also do a few problems each week that are randomly drawn from 'challenging' mathematics. Additionally, each week students will take a three hour block and do the A or B section of a Putnam. The purpose is to get practice doing these problems under exam conditions. We will then discuss how we wrote up the solutions, and compare our solutions to the 'accepted' published solutions. This will help us learn how much detail is needed / how to write answers / how to budget time. Additionally, we will analyze what methods are used to solve various problems, and what background material is needed -- it will be interesting to see what patterns develop! If we see there is a core list of techniques that constantly are useful, it might be worthwhile to try each one for a minute or two on each problem. As the Putnam nears, we will do at least one six hour trial run.

CONTACTING ME: You can reach me in Bronfman 202 (if I'm there it's office hours), email sjm1@williams.edu, or anonymously through mathephs@gmail.com (password 11235813, the first seven Fibonacci numbers).

TEXTBOOK: TBD