EXCEPTIONAL COMPUTER OLYMPIAD RESULTS
When announcing the Computer Olympiad results for 2007 in Cape Town this week, Peter Waker, CSSA Vice President for Education and Training remarked on how unique this year’s results have been.
For the first time ever in the Computer Olympiad finals:
- Three girls among the finalists
- Two bothers in the finals
- One school had four finalists
- Four medal winners from the same school
- Two brothers winning medals
- Half the medals go to historically disadvantaged individuals.
The Computer Olympiad is an annual competition to identify, encourage and reward programming skills among high school learners. The competition attracted nearly 33,000 entries for the First Round this year, and 3,300 for the Second Round. Twenty-two learners were invited to take part in the Final Round which took place at the University of Cape Town on 15 and 16 September. The winners were announced at a gala function at the Shuttleworth Foundation on Monday evening.
The Gold Medal, Standard Bank Trophy and R41,000 was won by Mark Danoher, a Grade 12 student at Pearson High in Port Elizabeth. This is the third time that Mark has reached the Computer Olympiad Finals. In 2006 he won a Bronze Medal – and a place in the team that competed in the International Olympiad in Croatia.
The two Silver Medals went to brothers Saadiq and Haroon Moolla, both from Rondebosch Boys’ High. Saadiq, now in Grade 12, was a Bronze Medal winner in last year’s Finals. Brother Haroon, who is only in Grade 11 now, participated in the Finals for his first time.
To make the Rondebosch domination complete, Raeez Lorgat (Grade 12) and Robert Ketteringham (Grade 11) won two of the three Bronze Medals on offer. Raeez has the distinction of having won the Computer Programming section of the Intel Science and Engineering Fair in the USA, and having a minor planet named after him.
Peter Waker, who organises the computer Olympiad, remarked: “The most medal winners we have ever had from one school is two. Now we have four from the same school, and what is more, two are brothers.”
The only non-Rondebosch participant to get a Bronze Medal was young Schalk-Willem Krüger, from Grade 10 at Ferdinand Postma High School in North West Province. Schalk-Willem, who skipped a Grade or two, participated for the second year. Last year he was the youngest participant this century, this year he is the youngest medal winner this century. [The youngest ever was Bruce Merry who won a Silver Medal while still in Grade 7 in 1995.]
Remarked Mike Murphy of Sponsor Standard Bank: “The aim of the Olympiad is to identify, encourage and reward programming skills. The Olympiad shows that South Africa has the talent, but it needs to be developed and nurtured.”
PYTHON PRIZES
IT multi-billionaire, Mark Shuttleworth, donated R100 000 in prize money for top six the participants who use the computer language Python in the Final Round of the competition. This was the language used by Mark Shuttleworth to develop the software on which his first successful business was built. By offering these prizes he wants to offer other young South Africans some of the same experiences and opportunities he had.
The Python Prizes were awarded as follows:
R30 000: Mark Danoher from Grade 12 at Pearson High, Port Elizabeth, EC
R20 000: Raeez Lorgat from Grade 12 at Rondebosch Boys’ High, WC
R20 000: Robert Ketteringham, Grade 11 at Rondebosch Boys’ High, WC
R10 000: Schalk-Willem Krüger, Grade 10 at Ferdinand Postma, NW
R10 000: Francois Conradie, Grade 11 at De Kuilen High, WC
R10 000: Francois van Niekerk, Grade 12, Parel Vallei High, WC
Karien Bezuidenhout of the Shuttleworth Foundation was inspired by the participants: “It is immensely rewarding and encouraging to note that not only do these medal winners possess excellent programming skills, they also already have their own visions of how these may be applied in future for the benefit of society, for example to provide affordable, wide-spread, broadband internet access to South Africans.”
FAREWELL
At the function, the Computer Olympiad said farewell to long-time head of the Computer Olympiad Scientific Committee, Donald Cook. Mr Cook was part of the group that set in motion the establishment of a Computer Olympiad in 1983 and has been head of the committee that sets the questions and checks the results since 1995. He will retire to Bredasdorp.
Added Donald Cook: “I have been privileged to be part of the development of the Computer Olympiad and its infrastructure. However, even more importantly I have been privileged to be part of the development and growth of many remarkable young people.”
Photos available on request.
Complete list of Final Round participants available on request.
_______________________________________________________________
Press Release by:
Peter Waker
Manager: Standard Bank/CSSA Computer Olympiad
Ph: 021-448-7864
Fax: 021-447-8410
e-mail: info@olympiad.org.za
Contact details of schools:
SURNAME |
NAME |
GRADE |
SCHOOL |
SCHOOLPHONE NO |
|
|
|
|
|
Abdullah |
Maryam |
11 |
Sama Primary and High School |
011-837-4553 |
Alger |
Simon |
12 |
Reddam House Atlantic Seaboard |
021-433-0105 |
Anderson |
Michael |
12 |
St Andrews College |
046-603-2380 |
Bristow |
Kieran |
12 |
Summit College |
011-464-1905 |
Conradie |
Francois |
10 |
De Kuilen High |
021-903-5121 |
Danoher |
Mark |
12 |
Pearson High School |
041-583-2111 |
Foster |
Donovan |
12 |
Michaelhouse |
033-234-1158 |
Grant-Stuart |
Alistair |
11 |
Crawford College Lonehill |
011-467-0936 |
Joubert |
Nereus |
12 |
St John's College |
011-645-3000 |
Ketteringham |
Robert |
11 |
Rondebosch Boys' High |
021-686-3987 |
Kisabaka |
Doudou |
12 |
Wendywood High |
011-802-4160 |
Krüger |
Schalk-Willem |
10 |
Ferdinand Postma High |
018-290-5539 |
Lorgat |
Raeez |
12 |
Rondebosch Boys' High |
021-686-3987 |
Manuell |
Graham |
10 |
De La Salle Holy Cross |
011-782-1693 |
McDougall |
Duncan |
11 |
Hatfield Christian School |
012-361-1182 |
Moolla |
Saadiq |
12 |
Rondebosch Boys' High |
021-686-3987 |
Moolla |
Haroon |
11 |
Rondebosch Boys' High |
021-686-3987 |
Salisbury |
Ingrid |
12 |
The Wykeham Collegiate |
033-342-0752 |
van der Merwe |
Kosie |
10 |
Brackenfell High |
021-981-5522 |
van Niekerk |
Francois |
12 |
Parel Vallei High |
021-852-1228 |
van Schalkwyk |
Barend |
12 |
Brackenfell High |
021-981-5522 |
Versfeld |
Rizmari |
12 |
Worcester Gymnasium |
023-347-0426 |
Contact details of students:
TWO SA STUDENTS WIN MEDALS AT INTERNATIONAL OLYMPIAD
Two South African students won medals at the International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI) held in Zagreb, Croatia. The two are part of a team of four that was selected from 33 000 participants in last year’s Standard Bank Computer Olympiad.
The IOI is an annual competition for young computer programmers. It is held in a different country every year. This year 282 participants from 73 countries took part. The competition itself takes place over two days. On each of the competition days, the participants receive three problems. They have five hours to write the computer programs to solve these problems. After 5 hours the evaluators use data sets of increasing complexity to check if the program can provide the correct answers in the allocated time – often less than half a second.
The two medal winners from South Africa:
Ralf Kistner, the 2006 Standard Bank Trophy winner for the highest mark in the South African Computer Olympiad – when he was in Grade 12. Ralf is now a first year student at the University of Stellenbosch.
Ralf is a regular participant in Maths Olympiads, having taken part in the 2004 Pan-African Maths Olympiad and the 2005 International Maths Olympiad. This is Ralf’s second year of participation in the IOI. He also won a medal at IOI 2006 in Mexico.
Ralf lists his hobbies as climbing, programming and maths.
Dirk B Coetzee, from Ceres, who won his place in the South African IOI team while he was in grade 12, can also boast a medal. He is currently studying Electrical Engineering at the University of Stellenbosch.
The other two team members were Charles Bradshaw from Rondebosch Boys’ High and Mark Danoher from Pearson High in Port Elizabeth. Both did comparatively well, but missed getting medals. Charles is at the University of Cape Town this year, but Mark is still at school and could therefore have another shot at winning IOI medals in 2008.
The team was delighted with the experience. “We are proud of the medals, but we also loved the opportunity to mix with young people from mo re than 70 other countries. The organizers gave us plenty of time to make new friends.”
Peter Waker, Vice President (Education & Training) of the Computer Society of South Africa comments: “It is amazing that a small player like South Africa can do so well in a competition with the rest of the world. The USA, Russia, China and Poland walk off with most medals, but two bronze medals for our chaps; that is a credible result
No one had a perfect score. Top was Tomasz Kulczynski of Poland with 95,6%, and second was Yi Yang from China with 92,5%. Four students even ended two days of competition with a total score of zero.
Donald Cook, team leader, reported that “One of the second day questions was extremely difficult, and only 3 out of 282 contestants received full marks for the most difficult question.”
In the Croatian capital Zagreb, there was no evidence of the civil war which raged in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990’s, but when the participants went further south to visit the Plitvice Lakes and the Nikola Tesla Centre, they passed buildings still pockmarked from machine gun fire and the occasional burned down house which had not yet been repaired.
A number of senior delegations, including South Africa, were invited to coffee with the Vice-President of Croatia. Like most Croatians she wanted to make sure the teams were well fed.
“I have heard no complaints,” the Croatian organizer assured her quickly.
“I have heard many complaints,” the South African Delegation Leader chipped in.
A deathly silence fell round the table.
“The food is too good, there is too much and we are all getting fat.”
The entire delegation consisted of:
Charles Bradshaw from Rondebosch Boys’ High (now at the University of Cape Town)
Dirk B Coetzee from Stellenbosch High School (now at the University of Stellenbosch)
Mark Danoher from Pearson High School, Port Elizabeth (currently in Grade 12)
Ralf Kistner from Paul Roos Gymnasium, Stellenbosch (now at the University of Stellenbosch)
Peter Waker: Olympiad Administrator
Donald Cook: Lecturer at UCT,Team Leader
Marco Gallotta: Deputy Team Leader
_______________________________________________________________
Press Release by:
Peter Waker
Manager: Standard Bank/CSSA Computer Olympiad
Ph: 021-448-7864
Fax: 021-447-8410
e-mail: info@olympiad.org.za
Photographs of the team and individuals available from info@olympiad.org.za
Photos available:
- Dirk B Coetzee receiving medal
- Dirk B wearing medal
- S A delegation
- Ralf Kistner, flag and medal
- Ralf Kistner and medal
- Ralf Kistner and medal on stage
- S A medal winners and coaches
- S A team and Croatian guide
Team contact details:
