Two NZ students win bronze at world premier computing event, support by UC

Two New Zealand students have won bronze medals at the world’s premier computer programming  contest for high school students in Italy.

Tony Sun from Auckland but originally from Christchurch and Logan Glasson from Christchurch received their bronze medals at the closing ceremony in Montichiari, Italy.
The annual International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI) had 317 contestants from more than 80 countries.

For these competitors there is no stadium filled with shouting supporters, instead a quiet auditorium with only keyboard clacking breaking the intense concentration during the two contests which each last five hours.

University of Canterbury’s Richard Lobb is the acting chair of the NZ Olympiad in Informatics, and helps train and organise competitors. He said the competition was designed to test the skills of the competitors in problem solving, designing algorithms and data structures, programming and rigorous testing.

``There are only around 300 students worldwide who get to go to the IOI, so even getting there is a great achievement. Both Tim Bell here at UC and I help out at annual training camps, teaching the students for a day each.

The NZOI is a valuable feeder into the tertiary level programming contests, where University of Canterbury has fielded the top NZ team every year for the last 5 years.
Glasson who attends Burnside High School said the trip had been a great experience.

``I’ve enjoyed meeting new people and doing challenging Informatics and it’s great to have won a medal,“  he said.