China’s mathematics talent shines Shi Haojia wins gold again, but US leads team rankings

China, with its vast talent pool and strong emphasis on academic competitions, has made notable strides in mathematics, as evidenced by its impressive performance in international math events.

On July 21, China faced its sixth consecutive defeat in the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO), finishing second to the US by just two points.

Despite this, 16-year-old prodigy Shi Haojia achieved a perfect score, topping the individual rankings for the second year in a row and securing another gold medal, Caliber.Az reports citing the foreign media.

Shi, from Zhejiang province, was the only competitor among the 609 participants from 108 countries to score a perfect seven points on each of the six problems. The US led the team rankings with 192 points, while China scored 190 points to place second.

Since its inception in 1959 in Romania with just seven countries participating, the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO) has grown to include over 100 countries from five continents, each sending teams of up to six high school students.

China has been a dominant force in the competition over the past three decades, claiming its first title in 1989 and securing the top spot a total of 24 times. Shi Haojia, a second-year student at Hailiang Senior High School in Shaoxing, Zhejiang, continues this tradition of excellence. His coach and school principal, Zhang Xiaoming, hailed Shi as a rare mathematical talent. Zhang noted that Shi’s remarkable performance stems from his deep love for mathematics rather than external motivations, as highlighted in a school article following Shi’s achievement at the 2023 IMO.

Shi Haojia, born in a rural area of Henan province, moved to Zhejiang at the age of nine. Demonstrating an early passion and talent for mathematics, he was already assisting his junior high school sister with her math homework while still in primary school. At just ten years old, Shi won a gold medal in a national primary school math competition. His exceptional mathematical abilities were recognized in grade 5, leading to a structured training regimen for math competitions.

In 2021, Shi was chosen for the YAU Mathematical Sciences Leaders Programme at Tsinghua University, which identifies and develops exceptional middle and high school students globally, offering training from undergraduate through doctoral studies.

Robotics scientist Geng Tao, formerly of a British university and now the founder of a start-up, anticipates that China's current second-place finish in the IMO will likely be a temporary setback.

China boasts a vast talent pool, and Chinese families often place a high value on academic competitions, Geng Tao noted. The Chinese government is also proactive in mobilizing national resources to achieve significant goals, such as securing gold medals at the Olympics, which supports the country's long-term ambitions in mathematics.

Geng observed that students in China and India typically exhibit a stronger interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) compared to their US counterparts, who are more inclined to pursue fields like finance, law, and medicine. An article published by *The Economist* last month highlighted China's strength in the sciences, noting that Chinese universities awarded 1.4 million engineering degrees in 2020—seven times more than the US.

China remains a major source of STEM talent, contributing a significant number of scientists, engineers, and technicians working in the US However, despite these achievements, some experts, including renowned Chinese-American mathematician Yau Shing-Tung, caution that China still lags behind the US in mathematics research. Yau, who retired from Harvard University in 2022 to teach full-time at Tsinghua University, stated in April that China's level of mathematics research has not yet reached that of the US in the 1940s.