Rather than completing typical practice worksheets, AP Calculus BC students have been participating in an integration tournament in which there are multiple rounds of one on one competitions of solving integrals. 

“Integration is one of the most important units in the entire year for BC calculus and I really wanted to encourage people to study,” AP Calculus BC teacher Jennifer Rumery said. 

Senior Riya Khosla saw the tournament as a great help to practice integrals in an entertaining way. 

“Although this was a math exercise, it was also just some friendly competition in the class where you could have fun with your classmates,” Khosla said. “As for me, this tournament helped to dust off some integration techniques I didn’t practice during Thanksgiving Break.”

The competition incentivized senior Shrenick Gannamani to start studying earlier and create better solving strategies. 

“During advisory, I found myself completing practice problems, something I probably would have not been caught doing in prior units,” Gannamani said. “Compared to when I was in AB, where I  would try every technique until one worked, I taught myself to recognize patterns, understanding instantly what approach would need to be implemented to integrate the functions.”

The tournament also helped Khosla practice pacing and completing problems in a timely manner.

“On the AP test, there isn’t a bounty of time to complete the questions, so the tournament was an excellent resource to decrease the amount of time it takes you to do a problem,” she said.

For Rumery, the competitive aspect is something that tends to fuel some students to practice and do well in the tournament.

“I think a lot of students are inherently competitive,” Rumery said. “Like they don’t wanna embarrass themselves, so they, they practice like it, it’s just kind of that intrinsic motivation to do well and that’s gonna force them to study is the kind of the whole goal.“