This theoretical framework is intended to guide a research proposalon national Mathematical Olympiads in Latin America. The goal is toelucidate the critical factors involved in the results obtained by the LatinAmerican teams in the International Mathematical Olympiad (IMO), andthe way local committees see themselves and their indicators for success.IMO results will be used as comparable metric for success, as it is thetop competition and is open to all countries, although for the countriesto be studied it is not the only competition they attend or their singleinternal metric for success. The proposal for a two-stage research, onequantitative and one qualitative, intends to reach ndings helpful for thoseorganizations, for the school students in their respective countries, and forsimilar organizations in other countries.