Shelbyville Number Sense student Kason Parker earned a 5th place medal at the Academic State UIL meet May 18th. This marks Kason’s third year competing at the state meet and his second straight year earning an individual medal at state in Number Sense.
Kason is the first Shelbyville Number Sense student to earn multiple individual state medals. He and his teammates, Malachi Sierra, Ethan Jackson, and Abby Shofner also earned 4th place as a team.
What is Number Sense? Besides being extremely difficult, it is an 80-question, 10-minute mental math contest that covers all high school math courses. There is no scratch work, no erasing, no mark overs, and if you skip a question, it is wrong. To excel in Number Sense, contestants must rapidly identify question types, recall the most efficient way to solve them, and be extremely accurate while writing nothing but the answer.
Countless hours of work and dedication go into becoming a great Number Sense contestant. To see what a Number Sense test consists of, go to: www.uiltexas.org/files/ academics/WebSample_NS2020SAC.pdf The Shelbyville Number Sense coach is Cole Harrison.