Junior and a senior teams of the Free State and Northern Cape participated in the South African Mathematics Team Competition (SAMTC).

This olympiad, organised by the South African Mathematics Foundation (SAMF) annually, is on a par with interprovincial competitions for sports like hockey, rugby, netball and cricket.

The SAMTC is sponsored by the Actuarial Society of South Africa (ASSA).

Teams participated in the SAMTC online, against others from all over South Africa.

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The competition consisted of an individual competition – in which each of the team members answered a question paper on their own; followed by a team competition – where each team of 10 members answered 10 questions together, consulting each other for the final answers that they submitted as a team.

The team members from the Free State and Northern Cape were trained to successfully participate in the competition over several weekends. The training was done by Hermina Oosthuizen and Marthinus Schoombie for the junior teams and by Jon Smit for the senior team.

The potential team members also wrote tests before and during the actual competition, which determined their positions in the teams.

The Junior 1 team, consisting of Gr. 7, Gr. 8 and Gr. 9 learners, took seventh place (two places higher than in 2025) in their division out of 64 teams; while the Junior 2 team was 38th, although it only consisted of six members instead of other teams’ 10 members. The senior team, consisting of learners in Gr. 10, Gr. 11 and Gr. 12, was 11th in the senior division, out of 67 teams. Learners who are interested in joining these teams, can contact dr. Elsie Schoombie on WhatsApp at 082 926 6674. The Living Maths Olympiad will be conducted in the fourth quarter. This is a fun and highly accessible introduction to taking part in mathematics olympiads from Gr. R, up to Gr. 9.