WPI Worcester Polytechnic Institute

2010 WPI High School Programming Contest

The WPI Computer Science department has committed to organizing each Spring a series of programming contests for High School students. The full details of past contest events are found in the table below.

The contest is open to schools in the Central Massachusetts area, and schools from Rhode Island, Connecticut and New Hampshire have also attended the event. Please contact the contest organizer, George Heineman (heineman *at* cs.wpi.edu), if you have any questions about the contest.

Prospective participants must register for the contest using our on-line registration system. For a list of current registered participants, click here.

The Computer Science department would like to thank Mark Freitas (a member of the CS department's advisory board) for underwriting the costs of the contest, which allowed all students to participate for free.

Past Contest Results

Our first inaugural event was held on March 6 2006 with eleven teams and thirty-three students participating. In the most recent 2009 event held on March 9 2009, a total of twenty-seven teams from fifteen school districts (and 95 students) participated.

Registration is now open for the 2010 event.

Past Events
2006 Contest
2007 Contest
2008 Contest
2009 Contest

Format of the contest

Contest Registration

  1. Schools who intend to send a team to the programming contest must register with WPI by February 12 2010

  2. Each school may register up to two teams prior to this deadline. For a list of currently registered schools, click here

  3. There are a limited number of slots available to participate in the contest. If our target of 30 teams is met, we will maintain a wait list of schools that would like to participate. All registrations will be finalized by February 15 2010

  4. Each team will consist of up to and including three (3) students. Each team may bring an advisor to the contest

  5. Team members must be enrolled at their schools and must bring to the contest a signed letter from their high school administration asserting that all team members are currently enrolled in good standing

  6. Directions to WPI

  7. Find your location relative to WPI using google

If you need more information, you can contact the Computer Science Department at 508-831-5357

Contest Schedule


Monday March 8th 2010
 8:00 AM Teams arrive and may use computers to get familiar with WPI environment. Juice, coffee, & light breakfast available
 8:30 AM Opening/Organizational Meeting
 9:00 AM Contest Starts!
11:30 AM Lunch available (students can work & eat at the same time, but no food is allowed in the labs)
 1:00 PM Contest Ends
 1:15 PM Awards Ceremony
 1:45 PM Conclusion of Event
 

  1. Each team will have access to a single PC computer running Windows XP. The programming environments are Microsoft Visual Studio C++ and Eclipse 3.5

  2. Teams may use their own reference material during the contest. Examples include language manuals, textbooks, or other printed material. Teams may not bring their own calculators, computers, or other electronic media

Contest Regulations

  1. The contest will be composed of twelve separate problems. There is no domain-specific knowledge needed to solve these problems

  2. Solutions may be coded using either C, C++, or Java. The official Java version used by the Judges is JDK 1.5

  3. Sample input data will be provided for each problem, together with the proper output to produce. Programs will receive ASCII input and produce ASCII output

  4. Once the contest starts, teams shall not receive any outside assistance on the programs. This includes browsing the Internet, eMail, cellular phones, instant messenger, or any other form of electronic communication. Teams shall not discuss any problem or solution with their team advisor. Teams shall not discuss the contest with other teams. Teams shall not attempt to interfere with the progress of other teams. In short, each team must work in isolation

  5. Team advisors can only observe the contest and shall not help their teams in any way

  6. Any violation of contest regulations will result in the disqualification of the team. All decisions are final

  7. Teams may electronically submit a solution (called a submission) for each problem any number of times. However, while a submission is being judged for a specific problem, the team will be unable to submit a new submission to that problem until the judges have judged the submission

  8. A judged run occurs when a judge evaluates a submission on a specific problem using private input data that is never seen by the contestants. If a judge considers a run to be successful (that is, it produces correct output using the private input), the submission is judged "P0: Correct". Once a successful submission has been received for a specific problem, the team will not be able to resubmit for that problem (obviously!)

    If the submission is considered unsuccessful, it is judged "E*: Specific Error".

    The unsuccessful submission categories are:

    E1 - Unable to Compile
    E2 - Execution Doesn't Terminate
    E3 - Java Exception
    E4 - CoreDump/SEGV
    E5 - Incorrect Output
    E6 - Incorrect Formatting
    E7 - Disallowed Functionality

    "E1" is used for programs that cannot be compiled by the judges and is language-specific. For C and C++, the program may conform to the language but cannot be properly compiled.

    Each submission is executed for thirty (30) seconds. If no output appears within this time period, the judge considers the program to be a non-terminating program and scores it as "E2".

    The code "E7" is reserved for submissions that improperly access functionality that the judges determine to be disallowed (such as submissions that access the file system, spawn system threads, attempt to send email, or otherwise access operating system or network system functionality). 

    The code "E6" reflects the decision of the judge that the submission produces correct results that are simply formatted incorrectly. Pay attention to all details regarding formatting!

  9. When a team fails to succeed on a given submission, the team can choose to rewrite the solution entirely, or even change languages; a team is under no obligation to reuse earlier failed submissions 

  10. All judge decisions are final. Teams must remember that the submission is being judged on private data known only to the judges

  11. Teams may submit written clarifying questions to the contest judges regarding the contest problems. All questions, regardless of their nature, will be answered in written form. If the judges determine that an error exists in a problem statement, a clarification will be issued and be made available to all teams. If no error exists, the answer to the clarification will only be made available to the team that submitted it

Contest Scoring

  1. All judge decisions for each submission are final

  2. The contest director is responsible for authorizing the overall ranking of teams once the contest completes. The decisions of the contest director are final

Maintained by heineman _at_ wpi.edu
Last modified: Mar 10, 2009
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