Not many could stump Unstumpable.
Three Okanagan College computer science students, Kevin Hall, Brody Travis and Martin Wallace placed second out of 74 teams nationally in the IEEEXtreme student programming competition. That also placed them 125th of 2,200 teams which competed globally at the 10th anniversary of IEEEXtreme.
Team Unstumpable, along with four other teams of OC computer science students, battled sleep deprivation and competitors from around the world in the 24-hour virtual coding competition put on by the Institute of Electrical andElectronics Engineers (IEEE), the 飞辞谤濒诲鈥檚 largest association of technical professionals.
The contest challenges teams to work collaboratively to solve a series ofprogramming problems released at the same time globally over the duration of aday.
鈥淲别 had a strategy going in as to how we would approach each question and wecommunicated well as a 迟别补尘,鈥� Hall said in a press release from the college. 鈥淲别started off strong and were in the top 15 worldwide after the first few questions,but the lack of sleep definitely impacted our problem-solving 补产颈濒颈迟颈别蝉.鈥�
Unstumpable put in hours of training with professors Youry Khmelevsky, Ken Chidlow and Jim Nastos who coached them and proctored the competition on campus.
The other four Okanagan College teams placed 22, 25, 46 and 52 in Canada.
Students 鈥渃补苍 practically apply their skills, which shows them the immediate implications of their studies in the industry, in research and in competitions such as 滨贰贰贰齿迟谤别尘别,鈥� said Khmelevsky, chair of Okanagan 颁辞濒濒别驳别鈥檚 Computer Science department.
鈥淭丑别蝉别 sorts of coding competitions help to equip students with the skills, languages, and processes to enter the fastest growing sector in the 翱办补苍补驳补苍,鈥� said Raghwa Gopal, CEO of Accelerate Okanagan.
Work demand is high in the 翱办补苍补驳补苍鈥檚 $1.3 billion technology industry, which is growing at 15 per cent per year, according to Gopal. Accelerate 翱办补苍补驳补苍鈥檚 job board has about 75 open jobs at technology-enabled companies available at any given time.
Though Wallace, Hall and Travis are second-year students, they all have held or are holding part-time jobs in 碍别濒辞飞苍补鈥檚 tech industry. 鈥泪迟鈥檚 great because at the college you have the skills 濒别补谤苍颈苍驳,鈥� Wallace said. 鈥淎迟 work, you have the business side of learning. You can see the full 辫颈肠迟耻谤别.鈥�
For a complete list of the competition results see or visit .
