A teenager in China performed so well in a math contest, she defeated A.I. — as well as students from prestigious universities including MIT, Stanford, and Princeton.
The outpouring of support and shock for the 17-year-old fashion design student was fueled by her humble academic background. Vocational schools in China are not known for academic rigor, and of the thousands of participants, Jiang Ping was the only one who came from a vocational school, state media reported. Jiang finished 12th in the latest qualifying round of the Alibaba Global Math Competition, a well-known, highly-competitive math contest, and secured her slot among the 801 global finalists for the final eight-hour test on Saturday.
The qualifying round ended last Saturday, lasting 48 hours and was conducted online with multiple choice and essay length questions. No A.I.
teams qualified for the finals, the organizers said in a post on Chinese social media platform . Jiang’s underdog win has spawned ardent supporters. A hashtag about her had gathered 17 million views as of Saturday.
“In a life not defined by others, anyone can be a dark horse,” read the hashtag in Chinese. The contest includes questions on applied mathematics, probability and algebra. Jiang, a fashion design student from the Jiangsu Province in eastern China, and her performance had impressed multiple Chinese universities who took to social media to congratulate her.
“Kudos to Jiang Ping! Anyone who has a dream is amazing!” Zhejia.
