Faculty of Science, Applied Science and Engineering
UNB Saint John

NB High School Programming Competition

Thursday, April 28, 2022 (9 a.m.-12:30 p.m.)

team fhs1

A computer programming challenge for high school students

The New Brunswick High School Programming Competition brought talented students from high schools throughout NB to the UNB Saint John campus for 13 years. In 2021 and 2022, the contest was instead held virtually, with school staff supervising contestants. Teams of two contestants are customary, though individual students are permitted.

Contestants test their computer-programming skills and problem-solving abilities. The contest consists of a number of programming problems of increasing degrees of difficulty for teams to complete. The team that solves the most problems wins, and ties are broken based on how quickly the problems are solved.

Prizes

Our sponsors provide generous prizes:

First place wins the Bill Davis Memorial Trophy, and wins a prize of a laptop per team member, provided by J. D. Irving, IT Division. Each member of the first-place team also receives a certificate worth $1000 off first year's tuition in the BScCS at UNB Saint John, provided by the VP of the Saint John campus.
Second-place team members each get an iPad (model yet to be determined), provided by IGT. As well, they receive a certificate worth $500 off first year's tuition in the BScCS, again provided by the VP of the Saint John campus.
Third- and fourth-place team members each get a $250 gift certificate toward technology purchases at a not-yet-determined tech retailer, provided by Encore Interactive and TrojAI. In addition, the VP of the Saint John campus provides each member of the third-place team with a certificate worth $250 off first year's tuition in the BScCS.

Additionally, all participants who solve some problems will receive $50 and $100 certificates (depending on the difficulty of the problems solved) good for first year tuition in any science, computer science or engineering programme offered by the Faculty of Science, Applied Science and Engineering at UNB Saint John.

View our photos from the 2019 event and the 2022 poster.

See the quick announcement of the results and draws for door prizes from 2022.

See a story from the UNB media people about the 2021 contest and its first-place winner (Victor Huang from Fredericton High).

Visit our Facebook page.

How to enter

Due to the virtual nature of the contest, schools can send as many students as they wish. Teachers from participating NB high schools should be the ones to register their students.

registration now closed

Registration needed to be completed by noon on April 22nd. If you have missed this deadline, you can try registering late, but it is not clear that we will be able to get the late registrations checked out and into the Kattis system. The sooner, the higher the chances of success!

For more information, contact nbhspgmcomp@unb.ca. If you are a teacher from a school that has not participated recently, we'd really like to add you to our mailing list.

As of April 22, here is a list of schools known to be participating this year:

High School	Contact teacher	Room
Fredericton	Kayoe Stewart	E108
Fredericton	Terri Brooks	F111
Fredericton Christian Academy	Lucas Candy

St. Malachy's Memorial	Jocelyn Wells
Leo Hayes	Jeremy Brown	D112
St. Stephen	Scott Legge	236
Simonds	Peter Woytiuk	A205/A201


Harrison Trimble	Joel Flanagan	320
Bernice MacNaughton	Jason Melendy	206
Saint John
Miramichi Valley	Kathy MacDonald	2221
Riverview	Stephanie Robertson	1029
Harvey	Nathan Hoyt
Kennebecasis Valley
Moncton
Sir James Dunn Academy
Sussex
James M. Hill Memorial

Sample problems

Looking to hone your skills? See the sample problems for 2019 or previous years (2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014). The problems used in 2021 and 2022 are linked from the scoreboards.

Contest rules

See our contest rules for 2022. These rules and procedures may be modified and/or extended right up to the time of the competition. Registered contestants will eventually be sent a link to a form where they can acknowledge having read and agreed to the rules.

Kattis

To gain familiarity with Kattis, potential contestants will need to create accounts at Open Kattis and they may also want to tackle some of the easiest-rated problems there. (The set of public problems is mostly intended for university students. Our contest will be developing a set of new problems suited for high-school students.) Teachers will find that it is easy to pull together practice contests with existing problems on Open Kattis, and the functionality of Open Kattis is very similar to what contestants will experience on the (non-Open) Kattis site used for the actual competition.

We have prepared a document, "Getting Started with Kattis". It is highly recommended to try out the steps highlighted in this document, so as to avoid problems during the competition. A second document, "Kattis During Contest," explains additional Kattis aspects needed during the contest.

The registration process requires you to give the email address that was used to set up your Kattis account. (If a different email address is given, there will be difficulties.)

Getting help during the contest:

Once the contest is running, contestants can use the Kattis "clarifications" system to ask questions about the problems they are supposed to solve, in case the problems seem unclearly worded. Some of the responses may be made available to everyone, if the judges think it appropriate. Do not use the clarification system for technical help (eg, difficulties with Kattis).

For the most part, non-clarification questions during the contest should be emailed to owen@unbsj.ca. Email is probably better for most questions.

2022 results

In 2022, we had about 87 students registered, representing 17 different schools. Due to covid, not everyone was able to compete, but we had 42 teams that attempted at least one problem, and 34 succeeded. Results can be seen on the scoreboard from the contest site.

Congratulations to Victor Huang and Simian Wang, Grade 10 students at Fredericton High, who took first place (the Bill Davis trophy). They solved six of the eight problems.
Haokai Xuan and RK, also Grade 10 students at Frederiction High, were team "Imagine Winning". And they did win second place, by solving five problems.
TL is a Grade 11 student at Saint John High, and won third place, solving four problems with the smallest time penalty in the group.
MG and Micah Landry are Grade 12 students at St. Stephen High and finished in fourth place, also with four problems solved.

About the competition

Every year (except Covid years!) teams from high schools across New Brunswick are invited to UNB Saint John's High School Programming Competition. Regardless of who takes which titles, every student will be a winner! Each student will have won by gaining the experience of working as part of a team, participating in a fun event, and making new friends.

Global Site Navigation (use tab and down arrow)