Australians Narrowly Fail to Win Medals in Athens IOI

Two Australians, Patrick Coleman, of St Peter's College, Adelaide, and Christopher Butner, of Anglican Church Grammar Schol, Brisbane, have naroowly missed Bronze Medals at the International Olympiad in Informatics, held in Athens during September.

Coleman and Butner scored 260 and 255 respectively out of a possible 600, with the cut-off being 265. Scores are in multiples of five. Coleman had won a Bronze Medal in 2003, when this event was held in Wisconsin, USA.

The other members of the team were Giancarlo Salamanca, of Wesley College Melbourne and Ramana Kumar of Canberra Grammar School. Salamanca had also won a Bronze Medal in this event in 2003.

Results of the Australian students are (max for each question equals 100):

(A blank return means no submission of program.)

Team Leader was Dr Ben Burton, of RMIT University, Melbourne, while Deputy Leader was Bernard Blackham, of the University of WEstern Australia.

Professor Peter Taylor, Executive Director of the Australian Mathematics Trust, which administers Australia's involvement in the IOI, acknowledged the support of the Australian Government, through its Department of Education, Science and Training. This had taken place through the Department's Quality Outcomes Program, which supports school-based activitiy for enriching the school curriculum. Australia's participation was also supported by the Australian Computer Society.

"These projects provide resources to enable all Australian students to benefit and enhance their future University study", Professor Taylor said.

Professor Taylor noted that students had been selected as part of a national program available to all secondary schools, with successful students trained by a dedicated group of volunteers, mainly Olympians from former years.

"This year, for the first time, over 80 countries participated and it is clear that this event is increasingly becoming more difficult as countries showcase their young talent in computer programming. It is disappointing that this year the team earned no medals. However there were some encouraging signs, such as the consistent performance of Patrick Coleman and the performance of Christpher Butner on the second day", he said.

"As good as the quality of our training is, though, our performance can only be consistently enhanced by accessing further resources, and we are working towards this".