Revere High School senior Joel Niemi sat in a desk in math teacher Joanne Gillette’s room after school on April 15th last year to take an assessment for the TrigStar Competition. Niemi finished within the first twenty minutes of the allotted time. Niemi then proceeded to turn in the test knowing he had practice soon. Little did he know that with a combination of the fastest time and a perfect score he won the competition, prevailing first in the state of Ohio.

The TrigStar Competition is a national contest sponsored by the National Society of Professional Surveyors. Students get one hour to answer a series of trigonometry related problems. Each individual winner moves onto the national level where students’ time increases to two hours.

Niemi is president of the Mu Alpha Theta math club. Niemi’s involvement with the club helped with his success during the competition. He also used practice problems to prepare and he was able to use a formula sheet throughout the duration of competition.

“Taking all the competitions throughout the year has really improved my ability to take contests,” Niemi said.

Niemi competed in the same competition freshman and sophomore year, but seniors were usually the ones who placed if anyone. In this particular competition, time is a determining factor, and Niemi finished within a short period of time.

“I had to go to practice, so I turned it in super early and I [was not] expecting to win, but I guess we all got the same number of questions right. So, because I turned it in early I actually won,” Niemi said.

Gillette, a math teacher at Revere High School, and adviser of Mu Alpha Theta math club is the main sponsor of math competitions at Revere. No student has been first in Ohio from Revere High School in the past, as Gillette stated.

“Joel is the only Revere Student to have finished first in Ohio in the TrigStar competition,” Gillette said.

The TrigStar Competition is open to anyone willing to try the test. Gillette helped students prepare by distributing practice problems from previous competitions. Other students this year had high ranking scores as well, including alumnus Russel Ahsan and Lucy Zhang, who placed third and fourth in the state respectively.

Senior Katie Jarvis, the Mu Alpha Theta treasurer, also participated in the TrigStar Competition. Jarvis shared the layout of the test for the competition.

“The first few [questions] are really easy, so you are supposed to do them fast, and the last one is hard. If you get it [that is] really good, and if you [do not] you just turn it in really fast,” Jarvis said.

Jarvis experienced difficulties at the competition this year due to a calculator mishap.

“My calculator [would not] go into degrees, so I had to convert everything back and forth. It took me a lot longer than it should have,” Jarvis said.

The Mu Alpha Theta math club meets at least once a month in Gillette’s room. The club attends as many as 24 math-related competitions during a single school year. The club’s activities entail math games, math skills that might help students during competitions, and tutoring before and after school.