ICPC 2025 final - College level STEM (CS) competition result.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:which usa universities entered?

https://worldfinals.icpc.global/scoreboard/2025/finals/index_North%20America.html

Thank you. Interesting that UT-Dallas did fairly well - above Purdue even.

1 pt ahead

Glad you know how rankings work!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They didn’t enter. Only 19 colleges from North America entered.

UMD did well overall. Interesting that Harvard did the best for NA and beat MIT.

Harvard's CS department is better than the rankings show. The issue is it's very theoretically oriented. Which is less desirable for graduate education right now (people want to dive into applications, esp. AI related) but very good if you're an undergrad trying to grasp the essentials of the subject for the first time.

??? Fundamentals are always wanted by graduate schools. No top tier PhD program wants someone who can only vibe code some AI pipelines together with duct tape and a prayer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:which usa universities entered?

https://worldfinals.icpc.global/scoreboard/2025/finals/index_North%20America.html

Thank you. Interesting that UT-Dallas did fairly well - above Purdue even.

UIUC probably drains away the best CS talent in the state, and UTD has a CS honors program and generous oos merit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They didn’t enter. Only 19 colleges from North America entered.

UMD did well overall. Interesting that Harvard did the best for NA and beat MIT.

Harvard's CS department is better than the rankings show. The issue is it's very theoretically oriented. Which is less desirable for graduate education right now (people want to dive into applications, esp. AI related) but very good if you're an undergrad trying to grasp the essentials of the subject for the first time.

Parent of Harvard CS major here. You are right - it is very theoretical. They like Math so can solve complex problems that students of most other colleges cannot. where Harvard falls short is actual coding. Other schools teach programming languages and are more applications oriented. Harvard kids need to pick up the languages they need. If they have not had exposure to CS in high school, many of them find it hard and change majors, often to Applied Math/Stats.

Love that we beat MIT in the Competition. Go Crimson!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They didn’t enter. Only 19 colleges from North America entered.

UMD did well overall. Interesting that Harvard did the best for NA and beat MIT.

Harvard's CS department is better than the rankings show. The issue is it's very theoretically oriented. Which is less desirable for graduate education right now (people want to dive into applications, esp. AI related) but very good if you're an undergrad trying to grasp the essentials of the subject for the first time.

In AI development, large language models (LLMs) are still largely theoretical, which is why many of the recent hires have PhDs. This isn’t something you can fake—you’re either genuinely skilled at it or you’re just good at talking.

Yes this is correct. I replied to the other poster and was wondering why they thought Harvard CS is not good for grad school. It is, especially now.

[Anonymous]

I just love the things showing true merits not power point