<p>So I recently took the Academic Decathlon and I found that math was the most difficult to get a good score from. To be honest, I didn’t think the actual math questions were difficult, but rather there were too many time-consuming questions and I was never able to finish it within 30 minutes. I, as a math-oriented person, was only able to finish 1/2 of the test and blatantly guessed on the rest, even though I knew I could solve the problems given I had more time. How can anyone answer most (if not all) of the 35 multiple choice math questions correctly in a half hour? To me, it seems nearly impossible even with continuous practice. </p>
<p>To the people that have taken the Academic Decathlon, what’s your perspective of the math section?</p>
<p>The math section is usually the most difficult section, because of the time limit. However, this year’s round 2 test was by far the hardest ever. There was only one score over 800 in the entire country, and I believe 700+ scores could also be counted on one hand. Somehow there was some mistake, and yes, it really was impossible to finish.</p>
<p>On a normal test, though, you have to be really good to finish. The best score I ever got was 829, and I had to guess on the last 4 or so on that test.</p>
<p>I scored 714 on math at state AcaDeca, and yes, I thought it was hard. I didn’t finish the test, I had about 7-10 left. Granted, I’m not that great at calculus, so I struggled and skipped most of those, and I haven’t really done math competition stuff this year.</p>
<p>Personally, I had a lot of fun with it, I didn’t practice for it, and I had never done AcaDeca so it was welcome surprise for me, since I tend to do well with speed based math questions with harder questions (I do well on AMC but did very poorly on USAMO last year). However, I can definitely see how it can be very discouraging to most people who wouldn’t score over a 400-500.</p>
<p>//There was only one score over 800 in the entire country, and I believe 700+ scores could also be counted on one hand. Somehow there was some mistake, and yes, it really was impossible to finish.//</p>
<p>Really? Is this information available somewhere? JW</p>
<p>Check demidectalk.com; they would probably be interested to hear your score. Maybe a fair number of people with good scores went under the radar because they were in lolstates. Were you the top score in the state? I know of someone that got a medal at CA state but didn’t qualify for USAMO, so it wouldn’t be shocking if you got one of the top scores in the country.</p>
<p>I agree that it tends to be fun, like a more computational version of the AMC. The first time I took one I was absolutely blown away by the pace required. My 829 was at the scrimmage, and unfortunately I only got 771 (or whatever) at the LAUSD competition, blowing a good shot at a medal.</p>
<p>lol</p>
<p>as an alternate i just went in to every test and slept. my proctor had to wake me up multiple times.</p>
<p>in all fairness it was the day right after my midterms ended and i was wiped with no sleep :P</p>
<p>I think math is actually impossible to finish. x_x Same here, I could do most of them if given enough time…I just do as much as I can then guess the rest.</p>
<p>This thread is a few months old, but I just <em>had</em> to revive it after I recently got murdered in math at our practice meet.
I was on number four when they told us we had five minutes left. And if that isn’t fail enough, when I bubbled out, I forgot there were 35 questions and only bubbled out to 30.
Blah. I’m no math wizard, but I never thought I was incompetent until I experienced Academic Decathlon math.</p>
<p>Oh goodness… I just like to lie to myself and pretend the math section doesn’t exist. Being an only humanities person, I think the most questions I’ve ever finished legitimately is five. Maybe…</p>
<p>^^Same thing happened to me at my first scrimmage, except that I had finished about 20 problems. But I was still shocked that time was almost up, and it was a definite downer.</p>