In China, about 200,000 participants will take part in the national China Mathematical Competition held in October every year. Out of the 200,000 participants (and some more from CWMO and CGMO), eventually 6 will make it into the China IMO team. The chance is about 0.003%.
In Singapore, about 2,000 participants will take part in the Singapore Mathematical Olympiad (SMO) Open category each year (in exact figures, 1895 participants in 2007, 1945 participants in 2008 and 1877 participants in 2009 -statistics obtained from the Singapore Mathematical Society website). Out of these participants (and some more who have not taken part in SMO Open but are recommended to take the Open category Special Round), only 6 will make it into the Singapore IMO team. The chance is about 0.3% (only counting those who take part in the SMO Open, not the whole cohort!)
Therefore, it is 100 times harder to get into the China IMO team than to get into the Singapore IMO team! I won't be surprised if there are young Maths talents in China who may be able to beat Terence Tao's (Australian) record of being the youngest IMO Gold medalist (at 13) but unfortunately due to the stiff competition, they can't make it into the China IMO team (top 6) earlier!
2 comments:
You missed out that like 1/4 of the ppl who take part in the open section are china scholars
But, most top winners (i.e. top 10)are local-born Singaporeans. China scholars may be able to achieve Gold award but I don't think they can beat the local top Math brains.
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