Prizes and Awards
The following information was presented earlier in the Competition but may still be useful for archival use.
Prizes and Awards
The Canada Jay competition gives awards to the top-performing official competitors in several geographical divisions, and also has a random prize draw for all Canadian participants, official or unofficial.
Performance-based Awards
Awards are only given to official participants (see our Eligibility page for details).
Students compete in a geographical division, usually a Canadian province, but some populous provinces are subdivided into smaller regions. All students in Canada are also considered for the Canadian Division. Students outside Canada compete in the International Division. See the diagram below:
Each geographical division is further divided by grade of the students, as well as having a Champion division that includes all grades.
For Canada Jay, the grade divisions are:
- Grade 4 and under
- Grade 5
- Grade 6
- Grade 7
- Grade 8
- (students above grade 8 do not qualify for awards in Canada Jay)
Thus, the most prestigious divisions are the Canadian Champion division (all students in Canada, regardless of grade) and the International Champion division (students outside Canada, regardless of grade).
For each of these divisions, a table of award winners is assembed as follows:
| Award | Recipients |
|---|---|
| Gold | All students tying for the highest score. |
| Silver | All students tying for the 2nd highest score. |
| Bronze | All students tying for the 3rd highest score. |
| Honourable Mention | All students who matched the 4th - 6th highest scores. |
All such award winners are identified after the competition on our website by name and school.
Cash Prizes: Each year, a cash prize pool is divided among the top award winners in the most prestigious Canadian divisions.
The CMS reserves the right to suspend awards or limit the number of awards in any category where there is a very low level of participation or to require a minimum limit score for awards.
Certificates
All official contestants receive a certificate suitable for adding to their math portfolios or framing. When the final results are announced, teachers/organizers will be able to log into their accounts to download and print the Participation certificates for all their officially-competing students.
Students who don’t earn performance award (as described above) receive a certificate that reads “Performance with Distinction”, if in the top quartile of students, “Performance with Honours”, if in the second quartile, and “Certificate of Participation” otherwise.
Students who earn one or more performance awards receive a certificate that identifies their awards earned.
Random Student Prize Draw
Anyone writing the competition in Canada is also eligible for random participation prizes. A number of prizes will be distributed to participants nationally.
