KHS Computer Science teams are working hard to bring home a UIL Academic State Championship this year. Last year’s team placed 2nd at Regional competitions in Lubbock.
Computer Science teacher and team sponsor, Shaheen Matuni, has entered the teams in a number of competitive meets including online events to prepare them for district, regional and state competition. {{more}}
Online meets are fairly new but catching on fast. Students are able to stay at school to compete. No travel time but the competition can be very tough. Schools enter from all levels and can be from all parts of the state, Texarkana to El Paso.
In the fall, teams from Kennedale High School entered into three online meets and won 2nd place each time. In October it was the CS team of Blake Bunnell, Cody Kovar and Tyler Ward. In November, it was the CS team of Tyler Ward, Blake Bunnell and Danny To. Then in December CS team members were Blake Bunnell, Andrew Conroy and Cody Kovar.
Computer Science competition is a very difficult and one that requires skill, a knowledge set and creative problem solving. First the students are each given a written exam in which they have 45 minutes to answer 40 questions. The material on these tests resembles material that upper level college students would be learning in their pursuit of a bachelor degree in Computer Science.
The next part of the competition puts three students on one computer for two hours as they solve as many problems as they can in a packet of twelve. Solving a programming problem means writing a program to meet the stated problems needs. The problems are very difficult and require a very deep knowledge of the material and experience. No problems are quite the same so they have to be creative in a short amount of time.
The individual written scores are added together and combined with the points the team receives in the programming part to make the overall team score.
Sponsor Shaheen Matuni, students Blake Bunnell, Tyler Ward, Andrew Convoy, Danny To and Johnny Zielinski compete
in Timberview UIL Invitational
On January 11th in the Timberview High School UIL Invitational held in Mansfield, the Kennedale CS team put it all together. Not only did they have the highest combined score on the written portion, they had the top score in programming, making first place a slam dunk. The winning team members were Danny To, Tyler Ward and Blake Bunnell. A second team of Andrew Convoy and Johnny Zeilinski competed but were short one member.
Future meets will include several online meets and a travel meet at Mansfield High School. District competition will be in late March.
