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AMC Powered by AoPS

The Cyberspace Mathematical Competition (CMC)

The American Mathematics Competitions (AMC) has partnered with Art of Problem Solving (AoPS) to launch the first-ever Cyberspace Mathematical Competition (CMC). The CMC is a free, fun, high-level online invitational international contest for high school students, with teams of up to 8 people from each participating country*. The actual contest will take place from July 12–14, and consists of 4 essay-proof problems per day, with a 5-hour time limit. Registration (by invitation) will begin on Wednesday, July 1, at 7:00 pm GMT, and end on Monday, July 13, at 3:59 am GMT.

The CMC's mission is to provide a fun opportunity for the world's top young math students to engage with challenging and interesting problems, and meet—at least virtually—peers from other countries. AoPS will provide a robust platform that will facilitate the contest itself, along with forums for socializing, and other mathematical activities during the course of the CMC.

View the full CMC brochure and try the contest problems.

CMC Details

On this page

Which countries will participate in the CMC?

As of 12 July 2020, the following countries* have indicated interest in participating. Listed alongside each country is the number of registered participants.

  • Albania (8/8)
  • Armenia (8/8)
  • Australia (8/8)
  • Austria (8/8)
  • Azerbaijan (8/8)
  • Bangladesh (8/8)
  • Belgium (8/8)
  • Botswana (0/8)
  • Brazil (8/8)
  • Bulgaria (7/8)
  • Canada (8/8)
  • Colombia (8/8)
  • Costa Rica (7/8)
  • Croatia (8/8)
  • Cyprus (8/8)
  • Czech Republic (8/8)
  • Ecuador (8/8)
  • El Salvador (6/8)
  • Estonia (4/8)
  • Finland (8/8)
  • France (8/8)
  • Germany (5/8)
  • Ghana (6/8)
  • Greece (8/8)
  • Guatemala (8/8)
  • Honduras (8/8)
  • Hong Kong (8/8)
  • Hungary (8/8)
  • Islamic Republic of Iran (6/8)
  • Italy (8/8)
  • Kazakhstan (8/8)
  • Kenya (7/8)
  • Korea (8/8)
  • Kosovo (8/8)
  • Kyrgyzstan (8/8)
  • Latvia (8/8)
  • Luxembourg (4/8)
  • Macau (8/8)
  • Madagascar (1/8)
  • Malaysia (8/8)
  • Mexico (8/8)
  • Mongolia (8/8)
  • Montenegro (7/8)
  • Morocco (8/8)
  • Netherlands (6/8)
  • New Zealand (6/8)
  • Nicaragua (6/8)
  • Nigeria (5/8)
  • North Macedonia (8/8)
  • Panama (8/8)
  • Paraguay (8/8)
  • People's Republic of China (6/8)
  • Peru (8/8)
  • Philippines (5/8)
  • Poland (8/8)
  • Portugal (6/8)
  • Romania (8/8)
  • Russia (8/8)
  • Saudi Arabia (8/8)
  • Singapore (8/8)
  • Slovakia (8/8)
  • Slovenia (8/8)
  • South Africa (8/8)
  • Sri Lanka (6/8)
  • Sweden (8/8)
  • Switzerland (8/8)
  • Syria (8/8)
  • Tajikistan (8/8)
  • Thailand (8/8)
  • Turkey (8/8)
  • Ukraine (8/8)
  • United Arab Emirates (0/8)
  • United Kingdom (8/8)
  • United States of America (8/8)
  • Uzbekistan (8/8)
  • Venezuela (6/8)
  • Vietnam (6/8)
  • * 'Country' refers to a country or in some exceptional cases to a territory/geographical region.

    Participant Information

    Page Labeling:
    Each page of your work should be labeled with your unique Registration ID, the page number and page total, and the problem number. For example, if you were assigned Registration ID "COL01" and had 3 pages of work for Problem 1, they should be labeled as follows:
    • COL01 Page 1 of 3 Problem 1
    • COL01 Page 2 of 3 Problem 1
    • COL01 Page 3 of 3 Problem 1

    PDF Creation:
    Once the 5 hour exam time period ends, you should double check that your submissions are all properly labeled, scan them, and produce a single PDF file for each problem. Try to compress the PDF to ensure the file is at most 5MB; larger files could cause technical issues. To scan submissions, you may use a scanner or a smartphone with a camera or another device with a camera. Once you've scanned a PDF, you can either load the contest page and upload the PDF directly on the device that you're on or send the PDF to your computer (via AirDrop, Bluetooth, or another method) and upload the PDF file from your computer. Here are some recommended scanning applications:

    • On Android devices, the Google Drive App has a scanning feature.
    • On iOS devices, the "Genuis Scan" app can be downloaded and the Notes App has a scanning feature.
    • Other apps that can be downloaded on iOS and Android devices are "Tiny Scanner" or "Cam Scanner".
    We strongly recommend practicing scanning before the contest to avoid issues on contest day. If you're having issues finding a way to create PDF scans of contest submissions, please contact us at info@artofproblemsolving.com.

    The CMC's open, collaborative scoring platform

    We will have hundreds of papers written in many different languages that need to be fairly evaluated, online, in a reasonable amount of time. To approach this problem, we are building an open and collaborative platform where all leaders will be able to see all participants' papers and to see all discussions about every paper.

    We expect the bulk of the work to be done by the team leaders who will carefully read their team members' work, but our open system will help everyone to compare notes, and work in consultation with the CMC problem captains.

    Timeline for team leaders

    • As soon as possible: Pre-register (by filling out the form linked to your email invitation). This lets the CMC estimate participation. You should indicate who the team leader is (along with any co-leaders), so that we can communicate with this person. Make sure the team leader and any co-leaders have an AoPS account.
    • As soon as possible: Select your team of up to 8 participants. Eligibility guidelines are in the FAQ. Official registration begins on July 1, at 7:00 pm GMT, and will last approximately one week, so you will need to know who is on your team by that time. All team members will need AoPS accounts.
    • As soon as possible: Determine how the exam will be administered. The default method is for each participant to take the exam at home, proctored ("invigilated”) by a parent or guardian. The exam will be made available online during a convenient time window for your region, and the participant can either view the exam on a screen or print it out. The participant then scans their work (using phone apps that we will recommend) to upload to the CMC. A possible alternative, depending on local conditions, would be for participants to take the exam in one location, proctored by the team leader. In this case, the team leader will be responsible for printing out copies of the exam and scanning the participants' work. Other alternatives may be possible. Note that the default method is simplest; choosing other methods will require advance planning.
    • July 1 (7:00 pm GMT): Registration opens. Team leaders and participants should have AoPS accounts, and the team leader should know the login accounts for all team members. During the course of the competition, participants will be identified just with a number (eg., KEN3 for participant #3 from Kenya). Participants can inform the team leader if they want their name to remain private or public when final scores are published on the web site.
    • July 10 (approximate): CMC contest will be available for leaders to translate into appropriate languages for participants. Finalized translations will be approved by July 12.
    • July 13: Day one of CMC.
    • July 14: Day two of CMC. Detailed marking rubrics for the 8 problems will be provided to team leaders.
    • July 14–15: Leaders work on problems, find possible alternative solutions and possible changes to the marking rubric. Preliminary scores submitted to the scoring platform.
    • July 15–18 (approximate): Scores finalized. As scores are finalized, they will be available on this website.
    • July 20 (approximate): Concluding events for the CMC.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    • Is the CMC "the online IMO?” No, the CMC is not an IMO event. We consider the CMC to be a fun way to practice for the actual IMO, but it is in no way an IMO or a substitute for the IMO.
    • How hard are the problems? The contest consists of 8 essay-proof problems, with two problems in each of the areas of Algebra, Combinatorics, Geometry, and Number Theory. Each day there will be 4 problems arranged in roughly increasing order of difficulty, with at least one problem substantially easier than an "easy” IMO problem, with the other problems comparable to the IMO in difficulty.
    • How are teams selected? Each country will have one designated leader, approved by the CMC organizers. In principle, this is someone involved in the national mathematical olympiad organization of that country. The team itself will be selected by the team leader, using whatever criteria are convenient for them. The participants must be at most 19 years old at the time of the contest, and must not be full-time students in post-secondary schools.
    • Why 8 people per team? We would like to try to expand opportunities to participate in high-level math contests. In particular, we are requiring every team with 6 people to have at least one female member, and every team with more than 6 people to have at least two female members.
    • How do participants take an online contest? How do you ensure security? The team leaders will have translated questions into the appropriate language of the participants, who will sit for the exam each day during a specified 5-hour time window that depends on location. They will use a scanner or a phone or computer camera to save their work, which will get sent to their team leader to distribute to the coordinators. They will be "proctored” or "invigilated” by a parent or guardian who attests that the submitted work is that of the participant alone. In other words, this is an event that is built upon trust.
    • Do the participants and leaders need special equipment? As an online contest, everyone will need, at a minimum, a smart phone with a camera that can download and upload images; ideally a computer or tablet with a stable internet connection as well. Additionally, each participant (and the leader and co-leaders, if there are any) will need a free AoPS account which can be created in a few minutes.
    • How will papers be graded ("marked")? We will have an innovative, trust-based, open system where the CMC problem coordination team works collaboratively with the team leaders to ensure a speedy and accurate evaluation of participants' work.
    • Besides the two-day exam, what other activities or events will take place? Some formal activities (for example, translation) will begin as early as July 10 and the final marking may not be done until July 21, approximately. In between, there will be various activities for participants and leaders, but we have not settled on a schedule. We welcome suggestions! As an online event, people will not be able to mingle and socialize in conventional ways. But we hope that our forums for discussion and collaboration will allow for really meaningful interactions between participants, mathematical and otherwise.
    • Will there be a cost to participate? The CMC is free. This is a volunteer effort, intended to provide a fun mathematical experience for dedicated young people. Since no one is traveling and needing food and lodging, it can be done inexpensively, and we are relying on the efforts of many dedicated and talented volunteers along with generous support of many AoPS staff members.

    CMC Sponsors

    The CMC would like to thank the following sponsors:

    • Akamai
    • Two Sigma
    • Penn Oberlander Family Foundation

    CMC Events

    We plan to have numerous events before and after the competition itself, including games, tournaments and social forums. Stay tuned for more information!