Henry Yao
(President)
Henry is a rising senior at Dougherty Valley High School. He started to participate in math competitions in 5th grade. He has qualified for AIME 4 times, MathLeague International once, MathLeague National 4 times and State MathCounts once. He loves to share his passion for math with younger students. He has coached the Cowconuts teams at BmMT since 9th grade and Windemere Ranch Middle School MathCounts team since 10th grade. Outside of math, he also enjoys playing soccer, biking and doing community services.
Ryan Wang
(Co-President)
Ryan is a junior at Granada High School in Livermore. He started competitive math in 6th grade. He has qualified for the AIME four times, the USA(J)MO three times, and was a member of MOP 2025. He placed 12th in Mathcounts state competition in 2023. He would like to help younger students enjoy math and achieving better math competition results through Cowconuts. He also participated in physics competitions and won USAPhO Bronze and Honorable Mentions in 2025 and 2024 respectively. Outside of math and physics, he enjoys swimming, biking and playing chess.
Kevin Zhang (Treasurer)
Kevin is a rising sophomore at Foothill High School. He has participated in math competitions starting in 6th grade. In 8th grade, he was the Hart Mathcounts school captain and qualified for the California State Mathcounts competition. For 2 years, he has participated in the BmMt, scoring 1st in the puzzle round and 7th in the team overall in eighth grade. He has also helped tutor the 2024 Cowconuts BmMt team. In 2024, he made the AMC 10 Honor Roll and qualified for AIME. He aspires to ignite a passion for math in others by organizing engaging workshops and activities. Outside of math, he enjoys playing badminton and contributing to the badminton community when he can.
Asher Ding (Secretary)
Asher Ding is a rising junior at Amador Valley High School. He started doing competitive math in 6th grade. He is an AIME qualifier and achieved DHR in AMC 10 and HR in AMC 8 twice. He won third place in the MathCounts chapter competition in 8th grade. He also achieved two HM in BMT and one HM in BAMO. Asher loves sharing his passions and experiences in math with younger students, and looks forward to working with Cowconuts to learn and contribute to the community.
Besides math, Asher started with robotics competitions in 6th grade. He has won two championships with his teammates in Vex signature tournaments and one division championship in the Vex US Open, and also helped younger robotics teams through tutoring and camps. Asher is also a swimmer.
Lusen Yao (Webmaster)
Lusen Yao is a freshman at Amador Valley High School. He started competitive math in 3rd grade. He placed 2nd at Mathleague nationals in 5th grade and 7th in 7th grade. He was the back-to-back champion (1st countdown and written competition) in the Mathcounts Chapter round and the Pleasanton Math tournament for both 2024 and 2025. He achieved a perfect AMC 8 score in 2025 and is a 2x AIME qualifier. He’s also trying to learn physics. In addition to math, Lusen plays the clarinet, piano and swims. He has also been awarded the Presidential Volunteer Service Award.
Alumni
David Zhang
(Former President)
David Zhang is a rising senior at Dougherty Valley High School. He has qualified for the AIME five times, the USA(J)MO four times, and was a part of MOP 2023. He placed 1st in California’s 2021 MATHCOUNTS State Competition and advanced to the National MATHCOUNTS Competition. He achieved perfect scores on the AMC8 in 2019 & 2020, and was the 1st place individual at BmMT 2021. Outside of math, he’s a USACO Platinum contestant.
Hunter Bian
(Former Vice-President)
Hunter is a rising senior at Dougherty Valley High School. He started doing competitive math in 6th grade like Math Olympiad and Mathcounts. Some of his achievements are getting to the state level in Mathleague, 24 on the AMC 8 in 2019 and AIME qualifying in 2021. He has also tutored some younger students in math and Chemistry; and he hopes he will be able to teach better through Cowconuts. Other than doing math, he likes to swim on weekdays at PLS.
Andrew Wen (Advisor and Former President)
Andrew is a senior at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts and has been an avid participant in math competitions since 6th grade. He is a 6-time AIME qualifier, a 4-time USAMO/USA(J)MO qualifier, and a MOP qualifier in 2021. In addition to American competitions, Andrew also competes in Canadian and International Olympiads with winning a Silver Medal in Asia Pacific Mathematics Olympiad (APMO) in 2022.
Andrew really enjoys writing math problems in his free time. He has donated plenty of problems to his school’s math competition and other math competitions/mocks on AoPS that he ran with his friends. He is looking forward to sharing his passion and intriguing ideas with the community.
Brian Li
(Former Co-President)
Brian Li is currently a senior at Mission San Jose HIgh School and is an avid competitor in various STEM fields. Being a part of the MIT PRIMES-USA Program, he has conducted and published original research in representation theory, his main field of interest. He has qualified for AIME various times, while earning a perfect score on both the AMC10 and AMC12. In addition, Brian has achieved DHR four times on AMC12, twice on the AMC10, and a gold medal on the USAMTS. In the past three years, he qualified for the USAMO twice and USAJMO once, earning honourable mention in both competitions. In competitions such as BMT, SMT, CHMMC, or CMIMC, he has ranked in the top 10 and tiebreaks before.
Besides math, Brian enjoys science fairs, physics, computer science, and watching basketball. He is a 2023 USAPHO Bronze Medalist and 2022 USAPhO Honorable Mention, a Broadcom MASTERS semifinalist, and in the USACO gold division. Overall, Brian wants to allow others to feel passionate about math and help both his students and himself grow in the process.
Emma Li
(Former Vice President, Math)
Emma is a senior at Mission San Jose High School. She is a self-driven STEM girl who is particularly passionate about competition math. Emma is a USAMO qualifier, a Math Prize for Girls Honorable Mention (Top 20) and three-time qualifier, a three-time AIME qualifier, AMC 10 DHR, and an AMC 8 perfect scorer. She placed 3rd individual and 1st in the team category in her Mathcounts Chapter and won 7th place in her grade for Mathleague national championships. Additionally, Emma has competed in quite a few girls math competitions, placing in the Top 3 Individual for Girls in Math at Yale 2022. Besides participating in math contests, Emma also has experience as a teacher of AMC8 and AMC10 classes, and as a problem writer for local math competitions. Outside of competition math, Emma enjoys physics, coding, and participating in science and engineering fairs. She is a USACO Gold Division contestant, as well as a two-time Broadcom MASTER and a Broadcom semifinalist. She looks forward to passing down her knowledge and experience to younger students, especially girls, and inspiring them to pursue interests in STEM.
Baiyu Zhu
(Former Vice President, Physics)
Baiyu Zhu (Bob) is a rising Senior at California High School. He is passionate about physics, college math, and chemistry. He is a 2022 US Physics Team member and qualified for the USNCO national round. In school, Baiyu is the vice president of physics club and is in charge of teaching physics competition concepts and became a Cowconuts physics teacher since 2021 winter. He is knowledgeable about questions ranging from USAPhO, IPhO, CPhO, and APhO. He explains physics concepts from the root and can come up with good physics problems. He enjoys teaching other students and is currently writing handouts for physics competition to be released publicly.
Baiyu is active on the physics olympiad discord server to talk about physics problems.
Abrianna Zhang
(Former Officer)
As of 2023, Abrianna Zhang is a rising senior at Foothill High School. As a three-time AIME qualifier and two-time MPFG qualifier, she has ample knowledge and experience for taking math competitions. She has participated in numerous math competitions and has won third place for the 2021 Girls in Math at Yale’s competition. An avid learner with a passion for math and teaching, she has represented her middle school multiple times as a member of the Mathcounts team and is currently the president of the Mathcounts club. She has also taken an interest in physics and has qualified for the USAPho Semifinal Exam. She aims to create an enjoyable and enriching environment for budding mathematicians in her community.
Kevin Jiang
(Former Officer)
Kevin is a rising Junior attending Mission San Jose High School. He has attended numerous math competitions since he was in elementary school, qualifying for MathCounts State twice, getting Distinguished Honor Roll on the AMC 8 three times, and qualifying for AIME in 2020 and 2021. Along with his competition experience, Kevin also enjoys giving back his knowledge to the community by teaching classes. He has been teaching middle schoolers basic AMC 8 and 10 materials and AoPS geometry since 2019 and leading weekly reading clubs and numerous math circles, allowing him to earn the gold Presidential Volunteer Service Award medal. Additionally, he has also co-led the 2nd Annual MPTF Math Competition, as well as part of the problem writing committee for the Cowconuts competition. He wishes to spread interest for math throughout the community, making math not a subject people fear but a subject people love.
Our Founders
Mason Fang
Mason Fang is a senior at Dougherty Valley High School and has been doing competitive mathematics since sixth grade. He is a 5-time AIME qualifier and perfected the 2020 AOIME. Mason is also a 4-time USA(J)MO qualifier and attended MOP in 2021. He has also participated in many college-run competitions including the 2019 BMT where he placed 2nd in Geometry and the 2020 SMT where he placed 2nd in Algebra. Outside of math, he is a 3-time USAPhO qualifier and an alternate for the 2021 USA IPhO team. Mason has five years of teaching experience in competitive mathematics and has taught students with skill levels ranging from MOEMS to advanced AIME, and many of his students have achieved success in their target competitions. In addition, he has taught physics classes to help students prepare for the F=ma exam. In his classes, he aims to create a fun learning environment to encourage students to continue studying math and physics.
Jennifer Zhang
Jennifer is a senior at Dougherty Valley High School. She has qualified for AIME for five years and has been invited to attend Math Prize for Girls at MIT for four years.
In addition to her extensive competition experience, Jennifer has dedicated much of her high school years sharing her love for math with other students. She is the president of her school’s Math Club as well as the head coach of the Windemere Ranch Middle School MathCounts team; under her training, the team won 3rd, 2nd, and 1st place at the Diablo Chapter in 2018, 2019, and 2020, respectively, for the first time in Windemere’s history. Besides being a paid math tutor, she has worked as a TA at several Alphastar Summer and Winter Camps and has taught at many Cowconuts AMC 8/10/12 camps and courses since 2017.
Through Cowconuts, Jennifer wishes to create a welcoming community for all math lovers. In particular, she hopes to encourage more girls to explore and thrive in STEM.
Eric Zhang
Eric Zhang is a senior at Mission San Jose High School. Ever since Eric was a child, he had a passion for problem solving, which has turned into a love for competition math.
Eric is a 3-time AIME qualifier and a 2-time USA(J)MO qualifier (Top 250 in US), with awards in various other local competitions. Outside of math, Eric also avidly explores other stem subjects, such as Physics, (USAPhO Honorable Mention), CS (USACO Silver), Machine Learning, Environmental Science, Statistics and more!
Eric is also an experienced teacher, having taught AMC 8, AMC 10, Abacus, and Chemistry. For the past 4 years, he has taught hundreds of students, including under-resourced high schoolers in LA and local special-needs learners. He hopes to give back to the community by spreading his love of STEM and competition mathematics to students everywhere.
Derek Guo
Derek is a senior attending Dougherty Valley High School. Ever since he was very young, Derek has enjoyed the art of problem solving from deciphering puzzles to studying for competitions. As a member of Cowconuts, Derek continues to share his knowledge with students and the community through engaging classes and intriguing insights.
From his accolades, Derek is a three-time AIME qualifier and a two-time distinguished honor roll qualifier for both the AMC 10 and 12, and he has also participated in other math competitions, like BMT and SUMaC, with the Cowconuts team and as an individual competitor. Individually, Derek placed 2nd in the MathLeague State competition in the 10th grade division, and 6th overall.
Derek has two years of experience as a tutor and over a year of practice as a paid teacher and TA for Cowconuts and Shengmeng math classes. Outside of Cowconuts, Derek trains the Math Olympiad team at Windemere Ranch Middle School, which includes 4 perfect scorers and an overall team performance of top 2% nationwide.
John Wang
Instruction Video (USACO)
John is a senior at Dougherty Valley High School, and has been learning math and participating in many competitions for over 6 years. Since he was a child, he has always loved doing math and problem solving, and hopes to share his passion with many others. In addition to qualifying for the State MATHCOUNTS competition, he is also a 4-time AIME qualifier, and placed 6th in a regional Mathleague competition. John has a solid teaching experience from teaching Math Olympiad and coaching the GRMS math team for 3 years. Two years ago, the team won 2nd Place in the regional competition and qualified for the State contest. In addition to his competition experience, he has taught multiple classes with the Cowconuts such as the AMC 10/12 winter and spring classes, as well as the AMC8 spring class. In the future, he plans to teach even more classes for Cowconuts students. As a Cowconuts member, he hopes to help more and more students succeed, and more importantly, learn to love math.
Cowconuts Math Club 