(CONTRIBUTED)

MADISON — Several Madison students proved their strength in mathematics at the Berry-Simmons Math Tournament, with sixth-graders acing the five top places from all tourney contestants.

The math meet was a collaborative effort between Berry Middle School and Simmons Middle School in Hoover.

“Congratulations to all of these Madison City students and math teams,” Discovery Middle School math coach and teacher Julie Goldston said. “They represented themselves, their parents, their schools and our school system extremely well.”

In Division 2 competition for sixth-grade teams, the Rainbow Elementary Math Team won first place, followed closely by Columbia Elementary School in second place.

Winston Van of Discovery tied for first place with a score of 100 among the eighth-graders in Division 1. Van tied with Allan Feng of Pizitz Middle School in Birmingham. Other place winners from Discovery were Tyler Tolbert, Ada Van der Zijp-Tan and Amelia Goldston.

Discovery again tied with Pizitz Middle School for first-place honors for eighth-grade teams in Division 1. Both schools scored 100 points.

In individual returns for seventh grade, Shantanu Kadam from Discovery earned second place. Other Discovery students in the Top 20 were Joseph Shi, Warren He and Kim Dang.

Students in Madison schools captured the top five places for sixth grade: Aditi Limaye, first, Rainbow; Tony Tian, second, Rainbow; Joy Duan, third, Rainbow; Lawrence Zhang, Columbia, fourth; and Corey Tolbert, fifth, Rainbow. Also in the Top 20 were Shreyas Pant, Anshul Moondar and Rohan Sethi of Columbia and Victoria Lee of Rainbow.

Final scores were delayed because officials had to tabulate scores by hand after the scantron machine failed. The device normally ‘reads’ students’ answers for scoring.

Along with their math skills, overall behavior of these students impresses Goldston. “Not only do they consistently do well on their tests, but they also exhibit good behavior and sportsmanship,” Goldston said. “I couldn’t be more proud.”