23/12/2022

2022 Retrospective: Medals, Projects, and Innovation

In the year that IMPA celebrated its 70th anniversary, there is much to celebrate in the field of mathematics. The excellence of the institution's teaching and research goes hand in hand with the expansion and innovation that IMPA plans for its future. We also had many achievements in the OBMEP (Brazilian Mathematics Olympiad for Public Schools) and on the national stage. We've selected five news items for you to remember. Check them out!

Children's Olympics – OBMEP

Foto: Alexandre Campbell | Divulgação OBMEP

The launch of the 1st Children's Olympiad – OBMEP , aimed at students from the 2nd to the 5th grade of elementary school, inaugurated the first national scientific competition for such young students in Brazil. More than 19,000 public schools registered 2.7 million participants in the initiative. By introducing creative and playful aspects into mathematics teaching, the goal is to transform children's relationship with the subject in the early grades.

IMPA Tech

Another important new development is the creation of IMPA Tech, IMPA's first undergraduate course , launched in partnership with the Rio de Janeiro City Hall. The undergraduate program will be housed in Porto Maravalley (Pomar) – a development located in the port area of the capital of Rio de Janeiro, which will also feature high-tech startups, companies, and investor offices. The bachelor's degree will be entirely free and will last four years. Student selection will be based primarily on student performance in knowledge olympiads, such as OBMEP.

Awards ceremony for the 15th OBMEP

Organized by IMPA since 2005, OBMEP awarded more than 500 young people with the coveted gold medals during the national ceremony of the 15th edition , held in 2019. In Salvador (BA), the ceremony celebrated the victory of the top performers in the Olympiad, which had more than 18 million participants. Of the 579 gold medalists, 443 attended the ceremony. All were invited to participate in the Junior Scientific Initiation Program (PIC), which offers advanced mathematics classes and a R$ 100 scholarship from CNPq.

Historic result at the IMO

Olavo Paschoal Longo (SP); Marcelo Lage (MG); Rodrigo Porto (RJ); Eduardo Nascimento (GO); Gabriel Cruz Torkomian (SP) e João Pedro Costa (CE).| Foto: OBM

In this year of many achievements, Brazil reached a historic result at the 63rd International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) , held in Oslo, Norway. The team selected to represent the country in the largest student-level mathematics competition won, for the first time, two gold medals in the same edition of the Olympiad. The country also won one silver medal, two bronze medals, and an honorable mention. This result places Brazil 19th in the overall country ranking for this edition.

IMPA's Olympic Girls

Meninas foram premiadas no Hackathon Meninas Normalistas, promovido pelo Museu da Ciência e Vida

This year, IMPA promoted thesecond edition of the IMPA Girls' Olympics (MOI) project, which encourages the participation of girls aged 14 to 17 in science olympiads, aiming to increase female representation in areas such as mathematics, computer science, and engineering. The initiative doubled the number of participating schools, inviting 10 institutions to activities that directly address female representation in science. The victory of the students in the "Meninas Normalistas" Hackathon , promoted by the Museum of Science and Life in Duque de Caxias, is one of the project's recent achievements. The robotics classes at MOI were the starting point for the young women to build Bimô, a robot that helps children learn about addition.