School of programming for elementary and secondary school students opens registrations!
For the fifth year in a row, Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, University of Montenegro in cooperation with the company DoMEn Ltd. has been organising preparations for the programming competition and school of programming for elementary and secondary school students. As in previous years, the course will take place in the computer classrooms of the Faculty and DoMEn company premises, in the two groups: beginners and advanced. Classes are organised every Saturday at 10 am for the beginners group, and every other Saturday for advanced group. The first classes will be held on Saturday, September 20th at 10 am, and all interested students can apply to informatikacg@gmail.com.
International and national competitions in programming are becoming more demanding and difficult. The students are required to have knowledge of a large number of algorithms, excellent math skills, a high level of use of a programming language, and developed skills of writing a programming code and eliminating potential errors in a code. This level of competition requires permanent work and special preparation for talented students. Following these trends, the organisers decided to introduce elementary school students to the school of programming. For now, these are seventh, eighth and ninth graders. The competitions in programming for elementary school students will be organised as well, and the winners of the competition would be potential participants in the Balkan Junior Olympics in Programming.
Learn algorithms and programming, start from scratch
Beginners group is a kind of school of programming and algorithms. It may be attended by all interested high school students completely free of charge, and from this year also by final year students of primary schools. The first classes are dedicated to creation of simpler algorithms and their implementation in the Java programming language. Participants learn the basic concepts of Java and are trained how to most efficiently solve a given problem. Courses are taught by professors, assistants and students of the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, as well as some of the students who have previously gone through the preparation process and are now attending the advanced group. Winners in previous national competitions in programming and in the Knowledge Olympics, and those who also won medals in the British Informatics Olympics are now lecturers to their younger peers.
Advanced group consists of those students who attended some of the Summer Schools of Programming or who already know a programming language that is designed for use in the Informatics Olympics (C, C ++, Pascal, Java). In this group the focus of the work is on the various techniques of problem solving and finding the most efficient algorithm.
The number of spots is limited- apply now!
The number of registered students in the last school year varied between 50 and 60 students from the following municipalities: Podgorica, Budva, Kolasin, Tivat, Berane, Pljevlja, Kotor and Niksic. The organisers hope that this year will the competition will have students participants from other Montenegrin towns. A part of the students has no possibility to travel to Podgorica every Saturday, so they will be sent class materials by e-mail or by Facebook. All materials are also delivered to informatics teachers in high schools, who can use them to organise additional classes and local competitions in programming. A special section dedicated to competitions was also opened on the website of the Faculty. The organisers also plan to create a number of films about the basics of programming that would serve as tutorials to students and teachers.
The students will also be offered an online task solving system, through which they can independently solve problems and check how many points they have won. DoMEn Cup will be organised for the first time during this school year, a competition in programming for elementary and secondary school students. Based on similar competitions in the neighbouring countries, students can complete tasks in online-competitions for three times, and the best in the last three rounds will make it to the finals.
Such work with students has also brought results. The first two medals at the Balkan Informatics Olympics in 2012 and 2013 were won by Luka Bulatovic, who is now a student of the Faculty and participates in the preparation of young peers. Following Luka’s successes, Dejan Todorovic, a third grade student of high school “Slobodan Skerovic”, in the Balkan Informatics Olympics held in Ankara from 10th to 18th August 2014 won a bronze medal, third in Montenegro in the last three years. The medal was expected, at least by all who worked with Dejan, because his results in the Knowledge Olympics in 2014 and the International Olympics of Informatics in Taiwan (IOI 2014, www.ioi2014.org), showed his steady progress.
