National Computer Science School Challenge

The NCSS Challenge is an online programming competition for high school students run by the University of Sydney. Unlike many programming competitions we will teach you how to program in a cool, easy to learn programming language called Python as we go along, rather than expecting you to be an expert coder already. However, if you are a seasoned coder, we have something for you too because the problems will range from relatively simple through to mind-bendingly hard.

The Challenge runs for five weeks, starting on the 6th August (but registrations are open now!). Each week we release a set of problems, and a set of notes to teach you what you need to know and help you through the problems. You will then have until the following week to submit your answers to the problems to our system. Our system will automatically mark your solutions and soon as they’re submitted, so you’ll get instant feedback to help you move your way up the leaderboard!

In 2012 there are three streams: beginners, intermediate and advanced. Teachers are also welcome to participate in the Challenge along with their students, and they can monitor their students' progress through the Challenge website.

Programming is a valuable skill for the scientists of the future: during the course of the competition you will learn valuable skills that can be used to analyse data, model scientific processes and test hypotheses. Many recent breakthroughs in physics, chemistry, medicine, biology, astronomy, economics, archaeology and many more fields have been made possible by computer science.

Take the challenge!