Mathematical Contest in Modeling - Rules - 2006

1. Teams may use any inanimate source of data or materials --- computers, software, references, web sites, books, etc., however all sources used must be credited. Failure to credit a source will result in a team being disqualified from the competition.

2. Team members may not seek help from or discuss the problem with their advisor or anyone else, except other members of the same team. Input of any form from anyone other than student team members is strictly forbidden. This includes email, telephone contact, personal conversation, communication via web chat or other question-answer systems, or any other form of communication.

3. Partial solutions are acceptable. There is no passing or failing cut-off score, nor will numerical scores be assigned. The MCM/ICM judges are primarily interested in the team's approach and methods.

4. Summary Sheet
   The summary is a very important part of your MCM paper. The judges place considerable weight on the summary, and winning papers are sometimes distinguished from other papers based on the quality of the summary. To write a good summary, imagine that a reader may choose whether to read the body of the paper based on your summary. Thus, a summary should clearly describe your approach to the problem and, most prominently, what your most important conclusions were. The summary should inspire a reader to learn the details of your work. Your concise presentation of the summary should inspire a reader to learn the details of your work. Summaries that are mere restatements of the contest problem, or are a cut-and-paste boilerplate from the Introduction are generally considered to be weak.
   To Summarize:
   • Restatement Clarification of the Problem - state in your own words what you are going to do.
   • Assumptions with Rationale/Justification - emphasize those assumptions that bear on the problem. List clearly all variables used in your model.
   • Model Design and justification for type model used/developed.
   • Model Testing and Sensitivity Analysis, including error analysis, etc.
   • Discuss strengths and weakness to your model or approach. Provide algorithms in words, figures, or flow charts (as a step by step algorithmic approach) for all computer codes developed.

5. Teams should keep in mind the following guidelines and rules while preparing their solution papers:
   • Conciseness and organization are extremely important. Key statements should present major ideas and results.
   • Present a clarification or restatement of the problem, as appropriate.
   • Present a clear exposition of all variables, assumptions, and hypotheses.
   • Present an analysis of the problem, motivating or justifying the modeling to be used.
   • Include a design of the model.
   • Discuss how the model could be tested, including error analysis and stability (conditioning, sensitivity, etc.).
   • Discuss any apparent strengths or weaknesses to your model or approach.

6. Papers must be typed and in English.

7. The solution must consist entirely of written text, and possibly figures, charts, or other written material, on paper only. No non-paper support materials such as computer files or disks will be accepted.

8. Each page of the solution should contain the team control number and the page number at the top of the page; we suggest using a page header on each page, for example:

       Team # 502                        Page 4 of 9
   

9. The names of the students, advisor, or institution should not appear on any page of the solution. The solution should not contain any identifying information other than the team control number.

10. Any preparation rule not followed is grounds for team disqualification.