Each month, math lovers from a variety of countries have been competing with each other to solve a mathematics problem posed by a faculty member in the Department of Mathematics. In initiating his “Math Problem of the Month” feature on the Bilkent University website, Prof. Azer Kerimov’s intention was to interest Turkish high school students in mathematics, but as it turns out, the feature has attracted followers from all over the world.
Prof. Kerimov, who is also committee chair for the TÜBİTAK Mathematics Olympiad, has been preparing questions since 2001. “We’re putting out intelligence-based questions, which are interesting and require less specialized knowledge, to draw learners into mathematics,” he said.
After the problem of the month is published on the internet via the Bilkent Department of Mathematics web page, problem-solvers send their answers to Prof. Kerimov. The names of the winners are announced on the page at the end of the month.
Since mathematics serves as a common language, this initiative has brought together math fans from countries that include Azerbaijan, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Singapore, Slovakia, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkmenistan and the USA as well as Turkey.
Anyone who is interested may access current and past problems of the month at http://www.fen.bilkent.edu.tr/~cvmath/prob-month.html.