The bi-annual Association of Computing Machinery Code-A-Thon is this week, February 25th-26th. It is a competition open to current and former USC students and alumni, regardless of field of study. It is divided into four divisions: 145, 146, 240, and 350. Challenges align with the concepts taught at the corresponding CSCE levels. For example lower-level division problems ask participants to use data structures or specific edge-case checking; upper-division might ask participants to process data in O(log n) time.

The ACM Code-A-Thon is a great social event for students to congregate while enjoying pizza, soft drinks, collaboration, and honestly, coding outside of class. It’s also rigorous. The social event starts on Feb 25^th at 7pm and lasts for an hour until 8pm when the competition actually starts. The competition lasts for 24 hours. Each division has about four to seven problems with varying point totals that reflect the difficulty of the problem. Points are awarded by the number of test cases a submitted solution passes. Winners are determined by the most points awarded; in the event of a tie at any particular level the tie-break goes to the person who completed the event fastest. 

To make the event more enticing to the public gift cards are awarded to the first, second, and third place finishers at each level to the tune of $100, $75, and $50. Also, in the past instructors have awarded extra credit points to people who participated in the event. ACM will help verify by keeping an attendance sheet with the names of participants and for which instructor they want extra credit. It is ACMs suggestion that should any instructor offer extra credit, they tie the extra credit to points earned by the competing student to avoid a situation where dozens of students sign up to compete but don’t attempt a solution.

Again, this is meant to be collaborative. There will be channels for participants to ask questions and discuss potential solutions, or just throw stuff on the way and see what sticks. We encourage discussion.

Please reach out with any questions you may have about the Code-A-Thon. Blake Seekings (seekingj@email.sc.edu) is the best person to contact.

Students who wish to attend please fill out this form, or get more information here.