Year 8 student Ella Porter was invited to the Department of Computer Science at the University of Oxford on Saturday 10 Feb as a finalist in a UK-wide computing competition – The UK BEBRAS Computational Thinking Challenge.
Reaching the final of the intermediate age group is an impressive achievement, as 71,146 students entered the first round for the age group (12-14). Ella was among the top 60 highest achieving students invited to the final round in her age group and was presented with her finalist’s certificate at a prize-giving ceremony at Hertford College.
The UK BEBRAS Computational Thinking Challenge, supported by Google, is designed to get students excited about computing and computational thinking. It is a problem-solving contest with questions inspired by topics in computer science. In the first round, held in their own schools, students have to try and solve as many problems as possible in the allotted time. There are six age categories. The highest scoring students from the four oldest age groups (Elite, Senior, Intermediate, and Junior) were then invited to the Department of Computer Science at Oxford for the finals over two weekends in January and February.
Caroline White, Director of ICT at Worksop College, said:
“This is a testament to Ella’s hard work and significant talent. To be in the top 60 of over 70,000 pupils is no mean feat. We are very proud of her and look forward to seeing what she achieves next.”
For more information, see bebras.uk