Category: Programming Competitions

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W&L’s Lakpa Sherpa ’25 and Ignas Volcokas ’25 – 2nd place winners at Hackathon

Lakpa and Ignas came in second for best education hack at Hoo Hacks 2023 with their EsyLearn project.

During the hackathon, Lakpa and Ignas  were inspired to produce a personal learning assistant that would accept and adjust to the learning needs of its user.   

Lapka and Ignas pose, smiling, in front of the Welcome to HooHacks sign.
Welcome to HooHacks!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

EsyLearn

EsyLearn communicates with users via a web interface where the users can easily speak and get responses back, just like talking to another human being. Through natural language processing, it provides responses both in text and audio for better understanding.  Within 24 hours, Lakpa and Ignas essentially created a virtual assistant that is as smart as Jarvis in the Iron Man Movies.

Congratulations, Lakpa and Ignas!

You can learn more in the W&L feature story and in the Hook Hacks project gallery.

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Professor Matthews wins Best Paper Award

Liz Matthews, Assistant Professor of Computer Science at W&L, was selected for the  Outstanding Paper Award  at the 13th International Conference on Game and Entertainment Technologies.  The paper, which was co-authored by Juan Gilbert (University of Florida) is entitled “ATLAS CHRONICLE: DEVELOPMENT AND VERIFICATION OF A SYSTEM FOR PROCEDURAL GENERATION OF STORY-DRIVEN GAMES”.
The Conference Committee, taking into account the blind review process, considers this paper of the highest standard.

Please click on the link to learn more…

https://www.gaming-conf.org/oldconferences/2020/

Additionally, because Professor Matthews won best paper, she got to extend the paper and publish in this journal:

http://www.iadisportal.org/ijcsis/

Congratulations, Professor Matthews!

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CSCI Major Janie Martin ’18 –Breakthrough Achievement at Hackathon!

Senior Janie Martin attended Rice University’s 7th annual Hackathon this past weekend in Houston with the goal of trying to solve some of the biggest problems in health care today.  The Hackathon competitors were in a 36 hour race against each other to develop new software and hardware to solve challenges identified by doctors at Texas Children’s Hospital. About 400 hackers competed for various prizes.

For Janie, the competition provided an opportunity to solve a medical problem that she herself once suffered from, encephalitis.  Janie and her teammates developed a product called Memory Eyes which is a device that uses image detection and facial recognition software to assist with cognitive disorders.  Cognitive impairment is a major component of encephalitis.  As Janie explains it, with encephalitis,  “You could be standing in a grocery store talking to someone when suddenly you have no idea where you are or who they are.” “With a press of a button, Memory Eyes will tell you who you’re talking to, where you are and remind you what you were there to get.”

Click on the link below to read more about Janie’s accomplishments and other cutting edge health care successes of Hackathon!

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Rice-University-s-Hackathon-work-to-solve-health-12225209.php

 

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Programming Teams Excel at Dickinson Contest

W&L Programming teams won 2nd and 6th place out of 20 at the annual Dickinson College Programming Contest on Saturday, April 5.  Team “Syntax Error to the Thrown Exception” placed 2nd with seniors Richard Marmorstein ’14 and Alex Baca ’14 and first year Lauren Revere ’17.  Team “Justice League” placed 6th with seniors Garrett Koller ’14 and Anton Reed ’14 and junior Samantha O’Dell ’15.

In such competitions, teams try to solve as many of the programming problems as possible in the least amount of time, fueled by pizza, snacks, and caffeine.  A solution consists of code that correctly executes for all possible correctly formatted inputs. The contest also included teams from Dickinson, Elizabethtown, Ursinus, Gettysburg, Lebanon Valley, and Messiah Colleges and Penn State – Harrisburg.  Team “F.R.O.G” from Messiah College won the competition.

The Programming Club and ACM Student Chapter at Washington and Lee is led by Alex Baca ’14.

 

Team Syntax Error to The Thrown Exception
Team Syntax Error to the Thrown Exception
Team Justice League
Team Justice League
Celebrating afterwards, Richard Marmorstein '14, Anton Reed '14, Lauren Revere '17, Alex Baca '14, Samantha O'Dell '15, and Garrett Koller '14.
Celebrating afterwards, Richard Marmorstein ’14, Anton Reed ’14, Lauren Revere ’17, Alex Baca ’14, Samantha O’Dell ’15, and Garrett Koller ’14.

 

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Programming Teams Win at Longwood Competition

Six members of the W&L Programming Club excelled at the annual Longwood Programming Competition, held October 19.  The two teams of three placed second and third out of 10 teams competing.

Team ArrayList, which placed second, included senior Richard Marmorstein ’14 and two first-years, Lauren Revere ’17 and Jamie White ’17.  Team UnlimitedCodeWorks placed third and included senior Garrett Koller ’14 and third-years Onye Ekenta ’15 and Samantha O’Dell ’15.

Plugging away: from left, Richard Marmorstein '14, Lauren Revere '17, Jamie White '17.
Plugging away: from left, Richard Marmorstein ’14,
Lauren Revere ’17, Jamie White ’17.

In such competitions, teams try to solve as many of the programming problems as possible in the least amount of time, fuelled by doughnuts and caffeine.  A solution consists of code that correctly executes for all possible correctly formatted inputs.  Both teams solved five of the seven possible problems. Longwood seniors Nick Pastore, Richie Noble, and first-year Andrew Brogan placed first in the contest.

The Programming Club at Washington and Lee is led by Alex Baca ’14.  The Club is now preparing for the imminent ACM Regionals competition, which will be held nationally at many sites on November 2. Go Generals!