Some students in Bob Fischer's math club at Honey Creek Middle School in Terre Haute, Ind., show up as early as 6:30 a.m. to work on math problems before the school day starts.

That may not add up, considering the math fears that many students harbor, but educators say a new program provided by a math organization is breeding success that leaves students eager to take on more math challenges.

The national organization is Mathcounts, which 25 years ago launched a national competition akin to the National Spelling Bee in which teams of four middle school students from across the county face off in annual problem-solving contests at the local, state and national levels.

The organization's Web site lists at least 44 Hawai'i schools on O'ahu, Kaua'i, Maui, the Big Island and Moloka'i that have Matchcounts clubs.

This year, the organization launched the Mathcounts Club Program, which lets schools start their own clubs that offer math challenges in which students compete only with themselves.

"The competition program is a great activity," says Lou DiGioia, director of Mathcounts and a former participant in the competitions. "But we realized that there were certain groups we were just not reaching."

Schools that sign up for the Mathcounts Club Program receive a "Club in a Box" resource kit. The monthly challenges are sets of five questions, like this one from September: At what time is the sum of the digits that represent the hours and minutes on a 12-hour digital clock the greatest? For example, the time 7:17 has a sum of 15.

All schools start at the "bronze" level, but by taking monthly math challenges and doing well on them, school clubs can move up to the "silver" and "gold" levels. And unlike the competition program, the club program is free.

The club program "brings in more kids who might be afraid to try it at the competition level," says Fischer, who has been coaching Mathcounts teams since the competition started. "It's for any student who wants to improve" and build strength in math that will help later in both high school and college.

Participating in the club not only helps students do better in their regular math classes, but it also helps them think logically, a skill they will draw on for the rest of their lives, says Freddy Weller, a math teacher and Mathcounts coach at Kenmore Junior High in Kenmore, Wash.

When some of his students came into his regular math class, "they weren't doing that well at math," but now their skills are "terrific," says Weller.

"It kind of empowers them, that they can do math."

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