What about the questions? It wasn’t easy at all for the organisers to choose these questions, they had to do a lot of background work. Jayler admitted that it took out a great deal of time organizing competition, especially the questions. They had to make around 100, almost like a few hundred over the few categories. “The main thing was making sure that they are off a suitable level, both for the students and to give them enough of a challenge without it being too easy.” Brandon added.
But to the two organisers, it wasn’t that bitter at all, they had a fulfilling and rewarding experience. They were proud when they got people gathering around, and seeing that eventually the entire community got together. People are really interested in maths and with TMO, the mathematics community in school got built up and more people got interested in this subject. This sense of accomplishment has filled Jayler and Brandon, so the work they did was very worthy. They were actually happy to see everyone having genuine support and fun, sometimes people who were thought to never join the competition actually showed up and were well supported by their friends. They felt contributing to the school, helping out the future generations.
But, there were some students who they noticed to be scared of losing which shouldn’t be the mentality that Image Credit of : Chun participants should have. The mentality should be- “Just go out there and have fun” in Jayler's perspective. AsYin someone in a class started joining, everyone would naturally get attracted and instantly have more people joining in. This kind of effect is truly surprising.
“I think it's sad people just don't want to be seen.” Brandon said. Their target was to make people support each other, and normalize this, then people can have confidence to join future editions of TMO.
TMO had received significant support from teachers and the school departments in many aspects. The school management gave the organisers permission to advertise in classes, the budget for prices and the use of the auditorium. Maths teachers also helped by giving advice on the seedlings, competitors and also making questions as well as advertising the event to students, encouraging people to get involved in TMO for a better experience. And the results have shown that TMO is worth these resources from the school.