On Saturday, Nov. 12th the UTA Computer Science and Engineering Department
will co-host the 2005 ACM South Central Regional Programming Contest with
LSU. Approximately 24 teams from Texas and Oklahoma colleges and
universities will converge on Nedderman Hall at the University of Texas at
Arlington. Another 50 or so will travel to Baton Rouge, LA. These teams of 3
students will compete to represent the region at the INTERNATIONAL
COLLEGIATE PROGRAMMING CONTEST that will take place April 9 - 13, 2006, in
San Antonio, TX.
The ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) International Collegiate
Programming Contest (ICPC) started at Texas A&M in 1970 and was hosted by
the Alpha Chapter of the UPE Computer Science Honor Society. The idea
quickly gained popularity within the United States and Canada as an
innovative initiative to assist in the development of top students in the
emerging field of computer science. The contest evolved into a multi-tier
competition with the first Finals held at the ACM Computer Science
Conference in 1977. Headquartered at Baylor University since 1989, the
contest has expanded into a global network of universities hosting regional
competitions that advance teams to the World Finals.
Since IBM became sponsor in 1997, the contest has increased by a factor of
five. In fact, inclusive of the European preliminary teams, the contest has
increased in just eight years by a factor of six! Participation has grown to
involve several tens of thousands of the finest students and faculty in
computing disciplines at over 1,582 universities from 71 countries on six
continents. The contest fosters creativity, teamwork, and innovation in
building new software programs, and enables students to test their ability
to perform under pressure. Quite simply, it is the oldest, largest, and most
prestigious programming contest in the world
For more information, see the International Contest web site at
http://icpc.baylor.edu/icpc/ or the Regional Contest web site at
http://acm2005.cct.lsu.edu/