Cargill Claim Mathex Win

If five cats catch five mice in five minutes, how many cats are required to catch 100 mice in 100 minutes?

Now considering solving this problem as fast as you can and with the pressure of performing for your House! The annual inter-House Mathex competition tests the students arithmetic power and one of their team member’s aerobic stamina. Here’s how it works: in small groups, they have to solve maths problems as fast as they can. When they think they have the answer, a nominated team member, the runner, sprints to the adjudicating desk to check the result. If it is correct, they earn five points and are given another question. If it is wrong, they can opt to try again, or pass on the question and forfeit those five points. The questions are tailored to the boys’ year level, but with the clock ticking they’re not as straight-forward to solve as in the classroom. The Mathex competition involved the Year 4 to 7 students competing in the final House event of 2015 in the Jubilee Sports Centre. Cargill had the narrowest of leads after the Middle School boys had taken part, with just one question separating them from Wishart. Hamilton and Chalmers were close behind, 10 points back. After the Year 7 boys had competed Cargill were runaway winners by 100 points, after two of their teams registered perfect scores, answering all 20 questions correctly!