........	....... Sandor Lehoczky, Richard Rusczyk, and Sam Vandervelde met during the summer of 1987 when they attended the Math Olympiad Summer Program at the US Military Academy. Their mutual interests (such as playing pool, seeking adventure, and guzzling orange soda) led them to become fast friends. Upon graduating from high school they formed the partnership Greater Testing Concepts and began producing The Mandelbrot Competition. After many years of creating mind-bending questions and writing the two volume best-seller The Art of Problem Solving, Richard and Sandor have moved on to other pursuits. Sandor is seeking his fortune in the world of finance and beyond while Richard oversees the world-famous web site Art of Problem Solving. .......
	Not surprisingly, Sam Vandervelde enjoyed taking math contests while in high school and college. He is proud of winning ARML his senior year while attending Amherst County High School, as well as being selected for the 1989 IMO team which took fifth place in West Germany later that summer. He graduated from Swarthmore College in 1993 with degrees in math and physics. Shortly thereafter he completed a five-year stint teaching math at The Roxbury Latin School, a private boys school in Boston, where he also coached middle school soccer and JV tennis. During this time he was awarded the Edyth May Sliffe Award by the Mathematical Association of America. Dr. Vandervelde received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in June 2004 and soon after joined the math faculty at St. Lawrence Univesity. During his eight years in the world of higher education he was granted tenure, became chair of the department, received the Henry Alder Award for distinguished math teaching at the collegiate level, and wrote Bridge to Higher Mathematics, an introduction to mathematical reasoning and proof-writing. During the summer of 2015 Sam Vandervelde relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area in order to help launch Proof School, a new school for kids in middle and high school who love math. There he serves as Head of School and lead math teacher. In addition to working with secondary school students on a daily basis during the school year, Dr.V spends a couple weeks each summer at MathPath and continues to stay mathematically active. He also enjoys creating word puzzles and playing pickleball. May 2017   ... Top of page | Introduction | Home