A contest, a centre, a faculty
The Euclid Mathematics Contest is set by the CEMC — the Centre for Education in Mathematics and Computing — inside the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Waterloo. First held in the 1970s, it has grown from roughly 300 writers a year to around 25,000 worldwide. Below: the history, the institutions, and what this site is — and is not.
From Ontario experiment to global fixture
The lineage begins in 1963, when a group of mathematics educators created the first contest for Ontario students. The Euclid itself dates from the 1970s — no official page names the exact year, and this site declines to guess. By 1979 it was aimed primarily at Grade 12, beside the Descartes Competition for final-year students — the family now mapped in the related-competitions guide.
The CEMC, in its own words
The Centre for Education in Mathematics and Computing is Canada’s largest outreach organization of its kind: around 300,000 students in 86 countries each year and 16 contests across Grades 5–12, plus free courseware and workshops. Its stated mission:
“To increase interest, enjoyment, confidence, and ability in mathematics and computer science among learners and educators in Canada and internationally.”CEMC · mission statement
Within that family the Euclid is the summit — the contest the CEMC describes as carrying the most complex and challenging problems it sets. The paper itself — format, syllabus, awards — is dissected in the competition guide.
A faculty with its own flag
On January 1, 1967, the University of Waterloo — itself founded only in 1957 — became the first university in North America with a separate Faculty of Mathematics. Today it claims the world’s highest full-time enrolment in mathematics; QS 2025 places it 39th globally in mathematics and 21st in computer science.
The faculty’s emblem is a pink tie — students hung a six-storey one down the new mathematics building in 1968, honouring founding professor Ralph Stanton’s famously loud neckwear. It has stood for the faculty ever since, guarded around the clock during Orientation Week after a 1980s kidnapping by the “Tie Liberation Organization.” The mathematics is serious; little else is required to be.
Because the university that sets it also reads the results. Waterloo states that Euclid participation is not required for admission, but writing it — or the CSMC — is required for some scholarship decisions; contests are “an asset to your application,” useful where a school system is unfamiliar. Chinese preparation agencies compress this into a nickname — the “Math TOEFL.”
And the standard stays honest: in 2026 a perfect 100 ranked 1st and a 99 ranked 7th among 19,796 official writers. How universities read a Euclid score →
en.cemc.net.cn is an independent English-language guide and preparation desk for China’s Euclid writers, operating authorized test centres. It is not affiliated with the CEMC or the University of Waterloo; official contest business runs through schools and the CEMC.
The editorial standard: figures come from official CEMC pages and results booklets; agency claims are marked as such; every page keeps to the current season — April 6–7, 2027. Free official papers are indexed in the past-paper archive; seat logistics live with registration.
Four questions for the record
When was the Euclid Mathematics Contest first held?
In the 1970s. The CEMC’s pages do not name the first year; third-party records agree only on the decade. Early editions drew roughly 300 writers a year, and a 1945 date seen in agency copy predates the University of Waterloo itself — discard it.
Who organizes the Euclid Mathematics Contest?
The Centre for Education in Mathematics and Computing — the CEMC — founded in 1995 within the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Waterloo. Of its 16 contests for Grades 5–12, the Euclid is officially the most challenging.
How many students write the Euclid each year?
Around 25,000, against roughly 300 in the early years. Enrolment peaked at 27,650 in 2024; in 2026, 23,985 wrote, 11,613 of them international — with Chinese students reported as the largest group outside Canada.
Is en.cemc.net.cn affiliated with the CEMC or the University of Waterloo?
No. This site is an independent English-language guide and preparation desk that operates authorized Euclid test centres in China. Official contest ordering, results and appeals run through schools and the CEMC; this site documents the contest and prepares its writers.