After winning numerous math competitions in Mexico, two very capable Oaxacan youths received invitations to participate in an international math competition in Singapore. They were thrilled and honored. But how would they pay for such a trip?
The answer arrived thanks to pizza. Jairo Adair Hernández Acevedo, 19, or Ada, as he prefers to be called, and Zuriel Gómez López, or Zuri, 17, had met at a recent math competition. They were the only Oaxacans invited to participate in the Singapore International Math Olympiad Challenge (SIMOC), a renowned competition held annually.
How they got to SIMOC 2025
Ada, who lives in San Andrés Huayapam, had worked in a pizza shop there until the beginning of 2025. One of his regular customers happened to be Doug Harmon, who also lives in Huayapam, and the two had become friendly. When the invitation to attend SIMOC arrived, Ada contacted Doug to discuss the competition and his idea to sell raffle tickets. He asked Doug if he and his friends would buy tickets.
Doug, unbeknownst to Ada, is President of the Oaxaca Lending Library Foundation (OLLF), which had recently initiated a scholarship program to help promising young Oaxacans. Doug asked Ada for details about the competition, and after doing some research, he decided that the youths were exactly the type of grant recipients the scholarship program was looking for.
There was just one problem: the scholarship program was relatively new and didn’t yet have sufficient funds. And time, too, was a critical factor, as the competition, scheduled for July 5-8, loomed on the horizon.
Raising money for flights and hotels
Doug looked through his contact list and began calling friends to ask for their financial support. In days, he had raised US $8,000, $6,000 of which paid for the flights and hotels.
At the same time, Ada and Zuri, who live in Espinal, near Juchitán, went to work raising money in their different locations with the help of family and friends. Zuri’s mother and sister baked carrot cakes for bake sales. And the youths received in donations for the raffles, speakers, earbuds and a session with a beautician. Zuri and his friends also conducted general tin-can, can-you-help-us fundraisers. In all, the youths garnered some 20,000 pesos (US $1080). The trip was secured!
“I really couldn’t believe this was happening,” says Zuri. Neither he nor Ada had traveled outside of Mexico, and now they were preparing for a life-changing trip to Singapore.
Traveling to Singapore
SIMOC sent them a letter suggesting they travel with a group from Morelos, led by Blanca Estela Contreras López. In the end, her uncle, who had worked in the travel business, helped them get the lowest airfares. So indeed, getting to the Olympiad in Singapore did “take a village.”
Some 169 students from 17 Mexican states attended, along with 30 teachers and government officials. Altogether 2,380 students from 37 countries around the world joined the competition. The students competed individually and in groups, where they had to solve complex puzzles as a team. Thanks to donations from Zuri’s aunts, uncles and grandmother, Zuri’s mother, Mayra Liz López Rojas, joined Zuri on the trip.
Zuri earned a bronze medal in his group and an honorable mention for his individual performance. Ada won a silver medal in a tough category designated “Mastermind.”
“The competition was hard,” says Ada. “I met a lot of magnificent students.”
Zuri says he never realized he was good at math until his teacher at COBAO Plantel 02, El Espinal, Genaro Jiménez Jiménez, encouraged him. “He kept telling me, ‘you’re good at math,’ ’’ Zuri says, adding that Jiménez selflessly coached him through numerous competitions leading up to Singapore. He will graduate from high school in 2026.
Ada says he has always found math easy, though he was diagnosed with ADHD when he was young. “I get bored easily,” he says, explaining his restless trait. His mother doubted his math ability until she read the letter inviting him to the Olympiad. “She’s very proud of me,” he says.
Ada graduated in 2024 from COBAO 04 Tule, and today, a picture of him hangs on the school’s wall honoring its most outstanding students.
Meeting students from around the world
At the competition in Singapore, the pair most enjoyed meeting students from many different countries, including India, Iran, Mongolia, Vietnam, Thailand and others. English is the official language in Singapore, and Ada, who has been studying English intensively for the last year, helped some of his new friends communicate.
The youths also found Singapore fascinating. “The city is really, really beautiful,” says Zuri. “Everything is so clean. There’s no crime, and it’s safe to go out at night.”
“There are very few poor people,” Ada says. “And you don’t see any dogs on the streets. We need to take better care of life here in Mexico,” he adds. “We must work on it. If we don’t, life is not secure.”
They both say they learned a lot from the discipline of math and competing. “It was an unforgettable experience,” says Zuri. “I’m going to study and compete again next year. I’ll do better than a bronze.”
The trip “opened my view of life,” says Ada. “Now I know there are a lot of countries I can go to and enjoy.”
New plans for the future
And their successes have encouraged them to think more about their futures. Zuri wants to study computer science and help educate the youth of Mexico. “My friends don’t know math,” he says. “Math improves your brain; it makes you more logical and rational. If the young go down, society goes down. We need to better educate the youth.”
Ada will be studying biomedical engineering at the Anáhuac University of Oaxaca in the fall. “The trip has restored my dreams,” he says. He hopes in the future to transfer to the Technological Institute of Monterrey, Mexico, or the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the U.S. His goal is to help people recover from serious physical challenges like the loss of a limb.
“If you want to do something in life, you must work for it, leave behind things that are bad for you, and stay focused,” Ada says. “I am really grateful to Doug. If he didn’t help us, we couldn’t go.”
Trim tabs are small surfaces connected to the trailing edge of rudders on a ship. They allow the ship to change course with tiny movements. The Oaxaca Lending Library Foundation (OLLF) Scholarship Program is privileged to have donors who see how their generosity is the trim tab in the lives of students and the future of Oaxaca.
Those interested in the scholarship program, please feel free to contact Karen Wuebbens.
Ms. Roderick’s journalism and fiction have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Maclean’s (Canada), Rambler, Red Cedar Review, MacGuffin and numerous other publications. Awards for her reporting include “Best Regional Reporting” (Associated Press), “Best Article” (National Association for Retarded Citizens) and others. She earned an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst and an MS in Journalism from Boston University.
