RAPID CITY, SD (Nov. 15, 2017) – A student team of coders from the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology took first place in the regional competition of the International Collegiate Programming Contest (ICPC), which qualifies SD Mines for the world
finals scheduled for April of 2018 in Beijing, China.
Mines students on the winning “Red Team” are Luke Videckis a sophomore computer science and math major, Andrew Stelter a senior computer science major and Matthew Schallenkamp a junior computer science and math major. Mines’ Red Team came out on top of 207 registered collegiate teams from both the United States and Canada who
entered the regional competition this year. Mines is a member of the North Central Region of the ICPC which includes schools from South Dakota, Minnesota, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, western Michigan, western Ontario, and Manitoba.
This marks the eighth programming team in Mines history to qualify for the highest level of competitive collegiate computer programming in the world.
“We were excited our top team won the regional, but I think it is also impressive that we had three teams in the top ten for the region. It is possible for one gifted student to really elevate a single team to the upper ranks of our regional competition,
but getting three teams in the top ten signifies that we have several outstanding students and truly gifted coaches,” says Kyle Riley who leads the Department of Math and Computer Science at Mines.
Besides taking home first place other Mines’ teams in the regional competition placed 5th, 10th, 28th and 52nd. “This is a strong overall showing that highlights the depth of computer programming skills
fostered by our math and computer science department at SD Mines. We are very proud of all the students who took part in the competition,” says Interim President Jan Puszynski.
Mines programming teams are led by emeritus computer science professors Toni Logar and Ed Corwin. The two professors bring decades of experience as coaches of Mines’ coding teams. This is the eighth time Logar and Corwin have helped bring a Mines team
to the highest level of collegiate coding competition. The long-term successes of this pair of coaches has won acclaim by the ICPC community. The husband and wife team were instrumental in bringing the 2017 ICPC world finals to Rapid City in May.
The Mines programming teams also receive support from coaches Roger Schrader, Paul Hinker, department head Kyle Riley and department secretary Reta Davies. Microsoft has also been a big supporter of Mines’ programming teams, alongside important contributions
from alumni.
Russian teams have won the ICPC world finals for the last six consecutive years. Russia is largely seen as the country to beat. Two members of the Red Team, Matthew Schallenkamp and
Andrew Stelter took part in an elite Russian computer coding boot camp in 2016 and they bring this experience to the international competition in April. The Mines Red Team also has an advantage in the experience of Schallenkamp, who returns to the
world finals for a second time, he also represented Mines’ in the 2017 competition.