The William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition, often abbreviated to Putnam Competition, is an annual

mathematics competition Mathematics competitions or mathematical olympiads are competitive events where participants complete a math test. These tests may require multiple choice or numeric answers, or a detailed written solution or proof. International mathematics compe ...

for

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students enrolled at institutions of higher learning in the

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and

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(regardless of the students' nationalities). It awards a

scholarship A scholarship is a form of financial aid awarded to students for further education. Generally, scholarships are awarded based on a set of criteria such as academic merit, diversity and inclusion, athletic skill, and financial need. Scholars ...

and cash prizes ranging from $250 to $2,500 for the top students and $5,000 to $25,000 for the top schools, plus one of the top five individual scorers (designated as '' Putnam Fellows'') is awarded a scholarship of up to $12,000 plus tuition at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

(Putnam Fellow Prize Fellowship), the top 100 individual scorers have their names mentioned in the American Mathematical Monthly (alphabetically ordered within rank), and the names and addresses of the top 500 contestants are mailed to all participating institutions. It is widely considered to be the most prestigious university-level mathematics competition in the world, and its difficulty is such that the median score is often zero (out of 120) despite being attempted by students specializing in mathematics. The competition was founded in 1927 by

Elizabeth Lowell Putnam Elizabeth Lowell Putnam (2 February 1862–1935) was an American philanthropist and an activist for prenatal care. She was born (as Bessie Lowell) in Boston, Massachusetts, the daughter of Augustus Lowell and Katherine Bigelow Lowell. A member o ...

in memory of her husband

William Lowell Putnam William Lowell Putnam II (November 22, 1861 – June 1923) (more commonly known as William Putnam, Sr.) was an American lawyer and banker. Putnam was the son of George and Harriet (Lowell) Putnam. He graduated from Harvard in 1882, and proc ...

, who was an advocate of intercollegiate intellectual competition. The competition has been offered annually since 1938 and is administered by the Mathematical Association of America.

Competition layout

The Putnam competition takes place on the first Saturday in December, and consists of two three-hour sittings separated by a lunch break. The competition is supervised by faculty members at the participating schools. Each one consists of twelve challenging problems. The problems cover a range of advanced material in undergraduate mathematics, including concepts from group theory, set theory, graph theory, lattice theory, and number theory. Each of the twelve questions is worth 10 points, and the most frequent scores above zero are 10 points for a complete solution, 9 points for a nearly complete solution, and 1 point for the beginnings of a solution. In earlier years, the twelve questions were worth one point each, with no partial credit given. The competition is considered to be very difficult: it is typically attempted by students specializing in mathematics, but the median score is usually zero or one point out of 120 possible, and there have been only five perfect scores . In 2003, of the 3,615 students competing, 1,024 (28%) scored 10 or more points, and 42 points was sufficient to make the top percentile. At a participating college, any student who wishes to take part in the competition may (limited by the number of spots a school receives); but until 2019 the school's official team consisted of three individuals whom it designated in advance. Until 2019, a team's score was the sum of the ranks of its three team members, with the lowest cumulative rank winning. It was entirely possible, even commonplace at some institutions, for the eventual results to show that the "wrong" team was picked—i.e. that some students not on the official team outscored an official team member. For example, in 2010,

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...

had two of the top five scorers in the competition and seven of the top 24, while

Caltech The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech or CIT)The university itself only spells its short form as "Caltech"; the institution considers other spellings such a"Cal Tech" and "CalTech" incorrect. The institute is also occasional ...

had just one student in the top five and only four in the top 24; yet Caltech took first place among teams while MIT took second. In 2019 the rules of the competition changed, with a school's team consisting of its top three scorers, and team ranks determined by comparing the sums of the scores of the team members.

Awards

The top five teams win $25,000, $20,000, $15,000, $10,000, and $5,000, in that order, with team members receiving $1,000, $800, $600, $400, and $200, respectively. The top five individual scorers are named Putnam Fellows and awarded $2,500. The school with the first-place team receives an award of $25,000. Each first-place team member, as well as the winner of the Elizabeth Lowell Putnam Prize, receives $1,000. Sixth through 15th place individuals receive $1,000 and the next ten receive $250. The names of the top 100 students are published in the '' American Mathematical Monthly'', and competition results are published in early April of the year following the competition. Many Putnam Fellows have gone on to become distinguished researchers in mathematics and other fields, including three Fields Medalists—

John Milnor John Willard Milnor (born February 20, 1931) is an American mathematician known for his work in differential topology, algebraic K-theory and low-dimensional holomorphic dynamical systems. Milnor is a distinguished professor at Stony Brook Univ ...

(also an Abel Prize laureate),

David Mumford David Bryant Mumford (born 11 June 1937) is an American mathematician known for his work in algebraic geometry and then for research into vision and pattern theory. He won the Fields Medal and was a MacArthur Fellow. In 2010 he was awarded t ...

, and

Daniel Quillen Daniel Gray "Dan" Quillen (June 22, 1940 – April 30, 2011) was an American mathematician. He is known for being the "prime architect" of higher algebraic ''K''-theory, for which he was awarded the Cole Prize in 1975 and the Fields Medal in 197 ...

—and two Nobel laureates in physics—

Richard Feynman Richard Phillips Feynman (; May 11, 1918 – February 15, 1988) was an American theoretical physicist, known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, the physics of the superfl ...

and Kenneth Wilson.

Winners

Top-scoring teams

Teams ranked by historical performance

Below is a table of teams by the number of appearances in the top five and number of titles. The following table lists Teams finishing in Top Five ( competition): For a recent analysis, the following table lists teams that finished in the top five since 2000 ( competition): The following table lists Teams with First place finishes ( competition):

Putnam Fellows

Since the first competition, the top five (or six, in case of a tie) scorers in the competition have been named Putnam Fellows. Within the top five, Putnam Fellows are not ranked. Students are not allowed to participate in the Putnam Competition more than four times. For example, if a high school senior chooses to officially participate, he/she effectively chooses to forfeit one of his/her years of eligibility in college (see

Gabriel Carroll Gabriel Drew Carroll (born December 24, 1982) is an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Toronto. He was born to tech industry worker parents in Oakland. He graduated from Harvard University with B.A. in mathematics and linguist ...

). This makes it even more of a remarkable feat to become a Putnam Fellow four times. In the history of the Competition, only eight students have been Putnam Fellows four times, with twenty-three others winning the award three times. The following table lists these students: The following table lists all Putnam fellows from 1938 to present, with the years they placed in the top five.

Ioana Dumitriu Ioana Dumitriu (born July 6, 1976) is a Romanian-American mathematician who works as a professor of mathematics at the University of California, San Diego.Putnam Fellow The William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition, often abbreviated to Putnam Competition, is an annual mathematics competition for undergraduate college students enrolled at institutions of higher learning in the United States and Canada (regar ...

, in 1996.

Elizabeth Lowell Putnam Award winners

Since 1992, the Elizabeth Lowell Putnam Award has been available to be awarded to a female participant with a high score, with three awards being made for the first time in 2019. The year(s) in which they were Fellows are in bold.