2025 YMSA WINNING, SHORTLISTED AND LONGLISTED ENTRIES

THE YOUNG MATHEMATICAL STORY AUTHORS (YMSA)
2025 COMPETITION

The Young Mathematical Story Authors (YMSA) competition is the world's first annual international competition set up to encourage young mathematics learners (4-16 years old) from around the world to embed their mathematics learning in a meaningful and engaging context through creating their own mathematical story picture books. This competition is organised by MathsThroughStories.org.

Judging Panel
In addition to Dr. Natthapoj Vincent Trakulphadetkrai (Founder of MathsThroughStories.org and Associate Professor of Mathematics Education at the University of Reading, UK), our judging panel also includes three prolific mathematical story authors, Kersti Worsley, Stuart J. Murphy and Cindy Neuschwander. Our judges have kindly agreed to let us name our annual awards for the winners of the 4-7, 8-11 and 12-16 age group categories as The Kersti Worsley Award, The Stuart J. Murphy Award and The Cindy Neuschwander Award respectively.

Judging Criteria

4-7 years old

Ability to come up with an engaging and original story (with a beginning, middle and end)
Ability to show how a mathematical concept in the story is used to solve a problem
Ability to use a combination of words, numbers and drawings to show the mathematical concept in the story
Ability to present your story clearly and the mathematics accurately (e.g., quality of drawings, neatness of presentation, mathematical correctness, etc.)

8-11 & 12-16 years old

Ability to come up with an engaging and original story (with a beginning, middle and end)
Ability to embed the chosen mathematical concept in a meaningful context
Ability to show how characters' knowledge of the chosen mathematical concept can help them solve a problem
Ability to use a combination of words, mathematical symbols/notations and drawings to show the mathematical concept in the story
Ability to explain the chosen mathematical concept in the story clearly without assuming readers' knowledge of the concept
Ability to present your story clearly and the mathematics accurately (e.g., quality of drawings, neatness of presentation, mathematical correctness, etc.)

Quick Stats
This year, we received entries from 1,361 students across 127 schools and homeschooling sites in 20 countries around the world, making this year's competition our most successful one in terms of the submission volume.

Reflecting our commitment to inclusivity, this year’s competition welcomed 798 female students, 562 male students, and one non-binary student.

To learn about our upcoming 2026 competition, click here.

To read the winning, shortlisted and longlisted entries from our past competitions, click on a year of interest:
2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019.