Maths whiz thanks his lucky genes
Bunbury Senior High School student, Kohta Shimada, has shown promise for the future after excelling in the 36th annual Australian Mathematics Competition.
The 13-year-old registered a score in the top 0.3 per cent for Year 8 students in Australia, the only student from the school to do so.
Kohta was shocked to receive such a high score, after getting high distinctions in past contests.
“I am pretty happy about it. I didn’t think I would get this much. I think I got high distinction last year and I thought I would get that this year as well,” he said.
Kohta has no real reasoning for why he is so good at maths – he actually puts it down to genetics.
“I think I must have a certain gene or something because my dad’s an accountant,” he said.
BSHS head of mathematics Tyril Houghton said Kohta had a special talent for the subject.
“It is just absolutely wonderful, in all my years of teaching I have never had a student win a prize before,” she said.
“Kohta sat the Year 10 exam and he beat all the Year 10 students’ scores and he is only in Year 8.
“We hadn’t actually taught him the curriculum, we just wanted to extend him and he did very well.”
Kohta will travel to Perth this weekend with three other Year 8 students to compete in the WA Mathematics Olympiad at UWA.
