The Ripon Grammar School boy from Easingwold is a top math expert

William Keens, 15, from Easingwold, was one of 600 students from hundreds of thousands of entries to make it to the finals of the UK Maths Trust national competition.

Just two points short of the Elite Olympiad award in Hamilton, he received a merit that places him in the top 200 UK young mathematicians for his age group.

It is the second year that the teenager, who attends Ripon Grammar School (RGS), made it to the finals of the junior high competition, where he had to complete a challenging two-hour paper with six problems, each requiring a full written solution.

He planned to study math, going on to A-level math, chemistry and physics and said: “I like the UKMT challenges because they encourage a lot to think outside the box. I was delighted to be among the top students in the country for a second year.”

He balances his studies with playing the saxophone and piano in school orchestras and is also an avid member of running and drama clubs. His goal is to study mathematics at university: “I love mathematics because of its endless potential for new problems that amaze and inspire.” ,” he said.

Of the RGS students in grades 9, 10 and 11 who participated in the first stage of the UKMT Intermediate Competition, which involved 25 multiple-choice problem-solving and reasoning questions, 24 received high-scoring RGS students coveted gold certificates.

Of these, 17 were among the nation’s 8,000 top-performing students who made it to the next round.

Outstanding seven of these RGS students were among the top 25 percent of students in the country who achieved top grades in this round and received certificates of achievement for doing so.

They are Charlotte Oakley, 14, Thomas Hallam, 14, William Bellaries, 15, and Thomas Simpson, 13, all from outside of Ripon, and Naiomi Robinson, 14, from Boroughbridge, Herbie Ash, 16, from Bedale, and Isaac Li, 15, from Leeds.

RGS math teacher Miss Rachel Bentley said she was very impressed with all the students’ achievements: “William did exceptionally well, that’s a tremendous achievement.”

Established in 1996, the UK Mathematics Trust runs the largest junior, intermediate and senior math competitions in the UK, attracting more than 700,000 participants each year.