C A M P U S C U R R E N T

ACM Team Makes World Finals

honorable mention at the 34th Annual World Finals of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) International Collegiate Programming Contest (ICPC) sponsored by IBM in Harbin, China. Only 103 out of more than 7,100 teams made it to the finals. HMC was one of 21 teams from the U.S. to participate. Each team of three was presented with 11 problems that required the students to quickly develop an algorithm and employ that algorithm in their choice of programming language to solve the particular problem. The team that solved the most problems correctly in the least amount of time won. Shanghai Jiaotong University solved seven problems to capture this year’s championship. Teams from several American universities, including Stanford, MIT and Carnegie Mellon University, solved five problems each and tied for 14th place. The HMC team correctly solved three problems and finished 65th out of 103 teams after five hours of intense competition. In November, the HMC team bested 61 other teams at the Southern California regional contest, where they led the contest for most of the five- hour, seven-problem event: they were the first team to solve one problem and the first to solve three problems. At the end of the event, they were the fastest of four teams that solved four of the contest’s seven problems. “I feel awfully fortunate to have worked with students so talented they

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actually brought me on their shoulders to China,” said Zach Dodds, professor of computer science and ACM coach for 10 years. One of the highlights of the trip was an excursion to the Harbin Ice

and Snow Festival, which included 10-story replicas of the Eiffel Tower, Coliseum and the Chrysler building. “We spent three hours awestruck by the snow sculptures,” Dodds said. Fielder said the 23-foot-high slides made out

of ice were pretty cool, too. One afternoon, each team was assigned a large

Anak Yodpinyanee ’12, Stuart Pernsteiner ’12 (kneeling) and Daniel Fielder ’11 enjoy the Harbin Ice and Snow Festival while in China for the ACM World Finals.

sphere and asked to carve out different letters spelling out the name of the competition. The HMC team spent nearly three hours carving an “A” that stood with the others at Harbin Engineering University until the ice melted in April.

– ELAINE REGUS

All Hands on Deck

he Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) described World Finals teams as “the cream of the crop,” and an HMC team was among them. Computer science majors Anak Yodpinyanee ’12, Stuart Pernsteiner ’12 and Daniel Fielder ’11—team HMC 42—earned an

One hundred fifty local elementary students gathered at HMC for World Science Cup day on Saturday, March 27 to take part in hands-on demonstrations of scientific principles. The event was hosted by Science Bus, an HMC student-led organization that coordinates teams of students to teach participatory science lessons to local school children, especially those from groups underrepresented in scientific fields. “All the hands-on experience is so wonderful,” said

Janice Raby Neely, 4th grade teacher at Allison Elementary. “Our kids love Science Bus. That’s what they wait for every Friday. Many don’t get these kinds of experiences regularly, so hopefully they’ll take this with them into college.” Raby Neely admires the strong community service

ethic among the HMC students in Science Bus. “It means so much that they take time out of their busy schedules to do this,” she said. Read more and view the video at www.hmc.edu/ newsandevents/science-bus.html

Exceptional Putnam Results

Mathematical Competition. Nationwide, 4,036 students competed in the challenging six-hour exam, and, indicative of the challenge, this year’s median score was a two out of a possible 120 points. In the individual category, Mebane placed 12th nationally and will receive $1,000 for his stellar performance. Special recognition goes to Iglesias who ranked 186.5 and Peter Fedak ’13 who ranked 202. Iglesias, Mebane and Newhouse will also re- ceive RIF prizes provided by HMC that honor the top finishers in the Putnam each year. Mudders who made the Top 500 list are Olivia Beckwith ’13,

Jeffrey Burkert ’11, Craig Burkhart ’12, Curtis Heberle ’12, Jackson Newhouse ’12, Kevin O’Neill ’13, Aaron Pribadi ’12, Jacob Scott ’11 and Donald (Lee) Wiyninger ’11.

Department of Mathematics faculty members

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H a r v e y Mu d d C o l l e g e S P R I N G 2 0 1 0

Andrew Bernoff, Nick Pippenger and Francis Su

served as this year’s Putnam Seminar coaches.

ophomores Jennifer Iglesias, Palmer Mebane

and Jackson Newhouse placed an exceptional 12th out of 546 colleges and universities at the December 2009 William Lowell Putnam

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