Out of 7,109 teams from 1,838 universities around the world, the computer programing team from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln is one of the best.
Every year the Association for Computing Machinery holds an International Collegiate Programming Contest to test the skills of computer programming students.
This year, a team from UNL will travel to Stockholm, Sweden, to compete as one of the top 100 teams in the world.
“We’ve been trying hard for it since freshman year,” said Tyler Lemburg, a junior math major who is part of the three-man team. “I’m a bit nervous myself about how it’ll turn out, but I think we’ll be fine.”
Lemburg and teammates Tim Echtenkamp, a junior computer science and engineering major, and Steve Trout, a senior computer science major, have been competing in local and regional qualifying rounds for the ICPC for three years. This is the first time they have qualified for the world championship.
“They are the most dependable team I’ve had, for showing up, for practicing and for really concentrating and making this a priority,” said Charles Riedesel, an assistant professor for computer science and engineering who has coached the UNL team for 11 years. “I’d say they have a good chance of ending up in the standings ... and if not this year, they’re a shoo-in for next year.”
More and more schools from a variety of backgrounds have been emerging in the international competition in the past few years, said Douglas Heintzman, Director of Strategy for IBM Software Group and Sponsorship Executive of the ICPC. However, UNL is one school consistently near the top.
“UNL’s got a bit of a history in the competition,” Heintzman said. “It’s one of the schools that’s consistently invited to the finals. … It’s a testament to deep resources in the science fields at your university.”
At each competition, the teams are given five hours to solve 10 real-world problems, using knowledge of subjects such as math and physics, Heintzman said.
For example, the students might need to figure our how to efficiently move ships with a certain amount of cargo through a port. The team would also have to program their computer to run the model properly.
They have to be careful, however, because entering a wrong answer results in a 20 minute penalty.
The team who answers the most problems correctly in the least amount of time wins.
IBM sponsors the competition each year to bring together up-and-coming programmers for recruiting purposes, and to shine a light on talented students, Heintzman said.
“This is a world-class caliber competition,” he said. “(Competing in the finals) makes you an incredibly attractive potential employee.”
But the competition is not all about winning and being seen by companies, Heintzman said. It’s also a chance to experience different cultures.
“You’ve got this really interesting mix of cultures,” Heintzman said. “Because of who they are, and because of their specific aptitude, they share a sort of common culture … that pulls them together.”
The ICPC competition is one of the only places where a guitarist from Iran, a drummer from China and a singer from Slovenia can rock out to Aerosmith in a Rockband competition.
While the UNL team will be focusing on the competition, they also hope to have some fun on the side, Lemburg said.
“I’m excited to check out the rest of Sweden, as well,” he said. “We’ll definitely be taking advantage of the travel opportunity as much as we can.”
To prepare for the competition, Lemburg said the team has been practicing once a week for about two hours, going over questions from previous competitions.
They hope to place higher than No. 50 in Sweden, he said.
“That’s our main goal for this year,” Lemburg said. “Other than that, we’re just hoping to have a really good time and do our best.”
jennagibson@dailynebraskan.com
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