Team Selection Process

Every year, our club can send 5-7 teams of 3 students each to compete at SoCal Regional, depending on how many team slots SoCal gives us.

SoCal Regional will be on November 16, 2024.

We select teams for SoCal by holding an individual contest at UCSD with similar problems and a similar time limit. The top 21 contestants form teams of 3, then all teams are ranked by performance in the individual contest. The top teams (however many we are allowed to bring) go to SoCal.

We will hold our 2024 team selection contest on October 19, 2024. Additionally, we will hold individual and team practices on weekends before and after the team selection contest to prepare for SoCal.

Team Selection Contest Rules

Permitted Materials

Contestants are permitted to use their own computers for coding in the IDE of their choice and to submit entries via VJudge. However, the use of search engines, AI tools, or any machine-readable media such as floppy disks, CDs, DVDs, and USB flash drives is strictly prohibited and will lead to immediate disqualification.

No electronic devices, including electronic calculators, watches with calculators, PDAs, cell phones, pagers, or personal audio/video players are allowed in the contest area. These items must be deposited in the computer labs prior to the contest. Standard watches lacking calculators or programming capabilities, medical devices like glucometers, and cameras are exceptions to this rule.

Please note that while we take precautions, the Contest Officials cannot guarantee the safe return or condition of any confiscated items.

Contestants may bring no more than 25 pages of physical resources such as textbooks and printed documents to the contest.

Conduct of the Contest

• Programming Languages: The official languages for the contest are C, C++, Java, Python 3, and Kotlin. Additional languages may be considered for future contests based on their support at the World Finals and participant demand.
• Submission Size Limit: Each submitted source file must not exceed 300,000 bytes.
• Notifications: Contestants will receive notifications about both their accepted and rejected submissions throughout the contest. Additionally, they will be able to see which problems have been solved by which other contestants.
• Ranking Criteria:
  1. Number of Problems Solved: The primary criterion for ranking is the number of problems successfully solved.
  2. Total Elapsed Time: In case of a tie, rankings will consider the total time taken to solve each problem, down to the second. A penalty of 1200 seconds (20 minutes) will be added for each rejected submission that leads to a successful solution later.
  3. Fewest Rejected Submissions: The number of initial rejections for problems that are eventually solved will also factor into the rankings.
• Communication During the Contest: Contestants may only communicate with contest officials during the contest.