Three Swarthmore teams recently competed in the regional qualifiers of the ACM International Collegiate Programming Competition (ICPC) at Shippensburg University on November 7, and came away with the top three places at the site (out of 25 teams!) First place went to Teo Gelles, Shantanu Jain, and Andy Lee. The team consisting of Ben Marks, Mario Sanchez, and AJ Valera finished second, while Owen Kephart, Sophia O'Malley-Krohn and Jack Yang finished third. The winning team won a plaque, while all teams came away with prizes. All three teams were not far from qualifying for the world finals in Thailand.

The ICPC is a five-hour competition testing students' skills in programming, problem-solving, and algorithmic thinking. In the recent past, competitive programming at Swarthmore has been mostly a fall semester activity, but there is talk about more practice this coming spring. If working on problem-solving and programming in a fun-and-competitive environment sounds exciting to you, come join us next time!