After solving 11-13 problems in the national round, Team BKDN.LeaderTurnsBack from the University of Science and Technology, a member school of the University of Da Nang (UD) won the championship of ICPC Viet Nam 2023 programming contest. The recent event was co-organised by the ICPC Asia-Pacific Regional Council, and the Viet Nam Information Technology Association (VUSTA).

Team BKDN.LeaderTurnsBack from the Da Nang University of Science and Technology has excellently won the championship of ICPC Viet Nam 2023

Ph.D. Pham Minh Tuan, a lecturer at the Faculty of Information Technology, the University of Science and Technology, said that ICPC Viet Nam 2023 is organised on the VNOJ system, according to the standard testing format of the ICPC International Collegiate Programming Contest. Under the rules, each participating team was given one exam question in English, on average 8-10 questions.

Members of each team worked together on one computer for 5 hours. If the team passes all the tests, they would be given 1 point with an additional score being the time taken to complete that test. Contest results were announced on the online Scoreboard system shortly after the judges received entries from contestants.

As the only team to solve 11/13 problems in the national round, Team BKDN.LeaderTurnsBack became the first representative of the Da Nang University of Science and Technology to win the ICPC Vietnam 2023 championship trophy.

Le Ngoc Bao Anh, a student of the class 23T-KHDL1, a member of the BKDN.LeaderTurnsBack team, said that the characteristic of the ICPC competition was that teams had to take online tests continuously for many hours.

The problems were announced one by one by the organisers. In case the teams have equal points, the prize would be awarded to the team with the fastest solving time. Therefore, the group was always highly focused, quickly exchanged test-taking strategies and used the contest time to complete the problems as quickly and accurately as possible.

Bao Anh is a first-year student, directly admitted to the Data Science and Artificial Intelligence major, the Da Nang University of Science and Technology after winning first prize in the National Excellent Student Contest in Informatics and the Bronze Medal in the Asia-Pacific Informatics Olympiad (APIO) 2023.

“The contest helped me gain experience and understand the process of organizing an international programming contest. The ICPC Viet Nam 2023 gathered most of the young information technology talents from universities, thereby creating an environment to develop information technology knowledge and skills for students," Bao Anh said.

Meanwhile, Phan Dinh Khoi, a student of class 19TCLC-DT2, a member of the championship team, said that the ICPC Viet Nam 2023 exam was quite interesting as it required candidates to apply a lot of algorithmic knowledge, programming skills and thinking ability to solve complex problems within limited time. Fully aware of this, team members focused on practicing, cultivating and adding knowledge to best prepare for the competition.

It is known that the ICPC 2023 qualifying round attracted a total of 546 participating teams, including 69 teams from universities in the central region. A total of 12 teams comprising of 36 students from the Da Nang University of Science and Technology, competed this contest.  

According to Ph.D Pham Minh Tuan, ICPC is a prestigious international programming competition for university students nationwide, thereby discovering, selecting and fostering excellent individuals and teams in the field of science, technology, serving the goal of digital transformation in the future.

In addition to the championship achievements made by the BKDN.LeaderTurnsBack team, the Da Nang University of Science and Technology also won another second prize (BKDN.YuumiFullCrit Team) and a third prize (BKDN.WonderBoys).

“With excellent achievements at ICPC Viet Nam 2023, the university will have 5 teams participating in the ICPC Asia regional contest held in Hue city in December 2023. This is also an important stepping stone for the school's students to set goals and strive to win a ticket to attend the ICPC Asia-Pacific regional finals scheduled to take place in March 2024 in Ha Noi." Tuan said while expressing his trust and expectations in the student group’s achievements.

Reporting by HUYNH LE - Translating by A.THU