Several years ago when attending the North Carolina Council of Teachers of Mathematics conference, my good friend Harold Reiter introduced me to a local teacher, Jason Batterson. Jason and I corresponded on and off for the next few years, and I saw him a few times at National MATHCOUNTS, which he attended as a coach of the North Carolina MATHCOUNTS team. Earlier this year, AoPS decided to start development of material for elementary school students. We were so impressed with Jason's work in North Carolina that we immediately asked him if he was interested in joining our staff. Fortunately, he agreed. Not only do we now have Jason at AoPS, but we also have his MATHCOUNTS preparation book, Competition Math for Middle School.

Special thanks to Harold (again) for introducing us to Jason, and apologies to the North Carolina students who were hoping to have Jason as your teacher!