‘Training key to making Math easier’

Agape Christian School MathCourt coach Frederick Guintu, right, poses with CNMI MathCourt champion Bei Bei Chen. (Jon Perez)

Agape Christian School MathCourt coach Frederick Guintu believes a methodical approach is needed in learning and understanding how to solve problems of one of the most dreaded subjects in school.

“There’s no secret to it. You just need consistent training and practice to understand the problems so you could solve them,” said Guintu, who is also ACS’ Mathematics teacher in middle school and high school.

“Our students here started at an average level of their math skills while they are still in elementary. Slowly they developed their skills thanks to everyday practice of giving them MathCourt problems to solve,” added Guintu.

Guintu moved to Saipan in 2010 and become ACS’ math teacher the following year. ACS opened in 2005 and its students had been one of the consistent finalists in the annual CNMI MathCourt competitions since Guintu joined its faculty in 2011.

He is now training ACS elementary (10am to 11:30am) and middle school (12:30pm to pm) students separately in time for their respective elimination rounds for the 2016 MathCourt season early this year. Middle school starts on Jan. 30.

Last year, seven from ACS and one from Eucon were part of Team CNMI that went to the finals in set from June 4 to 11. This year, three from ACS made it to the six-member CNMI MathCourt squad with three more as alternates.

ACS senior Bei Bei Chen, an alternate last season, topped the CNMI finals of the high school division held last week at the Saipan Southern High School with each Claire Song and Allan Zhao placing third and fourth.

Marianas High School’s B. Masrur Alam finished second behind Chen while Saipan International School’s Myung Jae Cho and Jaehoon Jang placed fifth and six, respectively. The seventh to 12th placers are the alternates with En Jie Hu, Andrea Feng and Rebecca Xu also from Agape.

Even Guintu’s oldest son, Frederick Dean Michael, has become a member of ACS’ MathCourt team and has represented the CNMI in the nationals since the fourth grade. Now in middle school, he was the CNMI champion while in elementary and in 2015 joined the team to the finals for being the Commonwealth’s champion as a sixth grader.

Guintu is a licensed mechanical engineer, finishing his Bachelor of Science degree at the Don Honorio Ventura Technological State University in Bacolor, Pampanga in Central Luzon in the Philippines. He worked as a design engineer for a private company in Saudi Arabia for 15 years before moving to Saipan to join his family.