SIS Math Club helped Jang, Cho

The newly established Math Club at the Saipan International School helped 11th graders Jaehoon Jang and Myung Jae Cho in earning spots on the CNMI MathCourt team that would be competing in the Nationals on May 13 at the at the Brookside Charter School in Kansas City, Missouri.

SIS’ Math Club, which has close to 30 students practicing and meeting every Tuesdays and Thursdays, was organized in mid-August with math teachers Kacey Deatrich and Insur Lee drilling their members with various math problems for them to solve.

The end result, 10 of the 22 finalists of the High School CNMI-Wide MathCourt competitions came from SIS.

“The Math Club meets twice a week after school every Tuesdays and Thursdays since most of the kids also have other commitments. Me and Insur Lee, who is another Math teacher, split the members and give them problems to solve,” said Kacey Deatrich, who was the SIS coach in the CNMI MathCourt.

She arrived six days before Typhoon Soudelor hit Saipan after teaching for four years in Australia, where she also obtained her masters in education. She finished her Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics at St. Joseph’s College in New York where she also taught for a number of years before moving to Australia. She teaches 8th to 10th and 12th grades at SIS.

Jang, who obviously has Math as his favorite subject, said aside from the Math Club he also credits his parents in making math easier for him.

“I don’t know, I find Math easy for me compared to my other subjects. My parents gave me different problems to solve everyday since I was in the second grade,” said Jang, who moved from Seoul to Saipan in 2008.

“It has became a routine for me. When I was in the 9th grade, I study 9th grade Korean Math, which is a little harder. Also, during the school break most of my friends went back to Korea while I stayed here and studied trigonometry,” added Jang, who likes to play volleyball and basketball in his free time.

Jang was a member of SIS II that won the silver in the team competition while Cho, who also went to last year’s Nationals as a 10th grader, is part of bronze medalist SIS I.

Daniel Lim and Jun Young Chung are the other members of Team SIS II, while Dong Hee Im and Donggu Hyon joined Cho at SIS I.

Cho was fifth while Jang sixth in the individual event. They finished behind gold medalist Beibei Chen of Agape Christian School, Marianas High School’s B. Masrur Alam (silver) and ACS’ Claire Song (bronze) and Allan Zhao (fourth).

“I want to major in education but my dad wants me to take up engineering. I don’t know, I haven’t decided yet,” said Jang, who is also a member of SIS’ track and field team.

The soft-spoken and visibly shy Cho said that they have yet to meet the other members of Team CNMI, which is set to practice for the first time with head coach Manny Borja tomorrow.

“My advice to my teammates is to practice more. Practice with the team and practice individually,” said Cho, who said that he needs to strengthen his Math skills in geometry.