2008 Woodie Awards
"Sudokool"
UW-L students compete in math competition
Colleen Umnus
Issue date: 4/23/08 Section: News
Three UW-L students recently participated in the International COMAP Mathematical Contest in Modeling. The team's solution ranked in the top 14% out of 1162 other entries, earning a merit status. Team members included Gus Borstad, Jarod Hart, and Kirk Wienkes.
The team designed a solution to the Sudoku game puzzle by mathematically examining the process of creating completed solutions to puzzles. Each of the Sudoku games that the team designed could only have one solution. The team constructed several different games at five different skill levels.
"What you want is a unique solution," said Borstad. "You could make one of these [puzzles] with two results, and you don't want that. We assembled the puzzle by removing one and seeing if it was still uniquely defined.
The three students were comprised of a variety of backgrounds - Borstad is a Physics major, Hart a Math major, and Wienkes a Computer Science major. "What you want on the team is a variety of people," said Wienkes, "but everyone needs to have a strong math background."
"I was kind of the abstract math thinker," said Hart. "We had Kirk [Wienkes] do a lot of the computer stuff, and I worked out a lot of the abstract algebra. Gus and I worked together on math algorithms."
After completing the solution process, the team wrote up a document explaining their results, aptly titling it "Sudokool."
Work on the project began at 7pm on Thursday, and ended at 7pm on Monday. The competition allowed teams to have the weekend to complete the project. According to the three, a lot of Mountain Dew was consumed, and breaks were only taken to sleep.
"I did it again this year because it was a lot of fun last year. During the competition it's kind of grueling, but it's a lot of fun. It's worth it," said Hart. "You sit in all of your math classes and think, 'when is this ever going to apply?' and this is a good way to do that."
The COMAP website offers two different questions as part of the contest. The UW-L team chose question B, which asked for the answer to a Sudoku problem. According to the website, the contest challenges students to "clarify, analyze, and propose solutions to open-ended problems."
The Sudoku game puzzle (also found on the back page of this newspaper) consists of a square grid which is randomly and incompletely filled with numbers. The object of the game is to fill in the missing numbers, making sure there is only one of every number going up, down, and in a square.
The team designed a solution to the Sudoku game puzzle by mathematically examining the process of creating completed solutions to puzzles. Each of the Sudoku games that the team designed could only have one solution. The team constructed several different games at five different skill levels.
"What you want is a unique solution," said Borstad. "You could make one of these [puzzles] with two results, and you don't want that. We assembled the puzzle by removing one and seeing if it was still uniquely defined.
The three students were comprised of a variety of backgrounds - Borstad is a Physics major, Hart a Math major, and Wienkes a Computer Science major. "What you want on the team is a variety of people," said Wienkes, "but everyone needs to have a strong math background."
"I was kind of the abstract math thinker," said Hart. "We had Kirk [Wienkes] do a lot of the computer stuff, and I worked out a lot of the abstract algebra. Gus and I worked together on math algorithms."
After completing the solution process, the team wrote up a document explaining their results, aptly titling it "Sudokool."
Work on the project began at 7pm on Thursday, and ended at 7pm on Monday. The competition allowed teams to have the weekend to complete the project. According to the three, a lot of Mountain Dew was consumed, and breaks were only taken to sleep.
"I did it again this year because it was a lot of fun last year. During the competition it's kind of grueling, but it's a lot of fun. It's worth it," said Hart. "You sit in all of your math classes and think, 'when is this ever going to apply?' and this is a good way to do that."
The COMAP website offers two different questions as part of the contest. The UW-L team chose question B, which asked for the answer to a Sudoku problem. According to the website, the contest challenges students to "clarify, analyze, and propose solutions to open-ended problems."
The Sudoku game puzzle (also found on the back page of this newspaper) consists of a square grid which is randomly and incompletely filled with numbers. The object of the game is to fill in the missing numbers, making sure there is only one of every number going up, down, and in a square.
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