![“[Building nerf blasters] became this outlet of creativity for me that hasn't been matched by anything else. The process [of] making a build complete to your desire is such a painstakingly difficult process, but I've had to learn from [the skills needed from] soldering to proper painting. There's so many different options for everything, if you think about it, it exists. The best part is [that] if it doesn't exist, you can build it yourself," Ishaan Parate said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/DSC_8149-900x604.jpg)
![“When I came into high school, I was ready to be a follower. But DECA was a game changer for me. It helped me overcome my fear of public speaking, and it's played such a major role in who I've become today. To be able to successfully lead a chapter of 150 students, an officer team and be one of the upperclassmen I once really admired is something I'm [really] proud of,” Anvitha Tummala ('21) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Screen-Shot-2021-07-25-at-9.50.05-AM-900x594.png)
![“I think getting up in the morning and having a sense of purpose [is exciting]. I think without a certain amount of drive, life is kind of obsolete and mundane, and I think having that every single day is what makes each day unique and kind of makes life exciting,” Neymika Jain (12) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/Screen-Shot-2017-06-03-at-4.54.16-PM.png)
![“My slogan is ‘slow feet, don’t eat, and I’m hungry.’ You need to run fast to get where you are–you aren't going to get those championships if you aren't fast,” Angel Cervantes (12) said. “I want to do well in school on my tests and in track and win championships for my team. I live by that, [and] I can do that anywhere: in the classroom or on the field.”](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/DSC5146-900x601.jpg)
![“[Volleyball has] taught me how to fall correctly, and another thing it taught is that you don’t have to be the best at something to be good at it. If you just hit the ball in a smart way, then it still scores points and you’re good at it. You could be a background player and still make a much bigger impact on the team than you would think,” Anya Gert (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AnnaGert_JinTuan_HoHPhotoEdited-600x900.jpeg)
![“I'm not nearly there yet, but [my confidence has] definitely been getting better since I was pretty shy and timid coming into Harker my freshman year. I know that there's a lot of people that are really confident in what they do, and I really admire them. Everyone's so driven and that has really pushed me to kind of try to find my own place in high school and be more confident,” Alyssa Huang (’20) said.](https://harkeraquila.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/AlyssaHuang_EmilyChen_HoHPhoto-900x749.jpeg)
Upper school hosts 2017 Harker Programming Invitational
Even Hynes, Make School Head of Community, mands the booth of Make School, which teaches students how to create and publish programming projects. The Harker Programming Invitational was held on Mar. 19.
March 28, 2017
Scattered around the Nichols atrium and in the science classrooms with their heads craned forward, the students in each of the 46 teams huddled at their own tables, focused intently on the programming problem they were racing to solve. The Harker Programming club hosted its annual invitational last weekend. This year’s theme of the invitational problems was pirates.
Modeled after the Stanford ProCo, a larger programming competition, the Harker Programming Invitational challenges high school students, both novice and advanced, to compete in teams of two or three. Each year, around 50 teams participate in Harker’s invitational. With one computer per team, each group collaborates to code a solution to problems created by club officers.
“We award prizes based on how well the teams do. These problems are algorithmic-based, so it doesn’t really matter what programming language you use, so we’re open to all sorts of teams like that,” Programming club co-president David Zhu (12) said. “I help write problems, and we also have several officers writing problems as well.”
Club officers also have fun while the competing students enjoy the event that they planned.
“What excites me most is to watch the officers pull off an event and feel proud of what they did,” upper school computer science teacher Susan King said. “Those things that don’t work, they have to be creative problem solvers in the moment and they usually feel great about how they pulled that off as well.”
In addition to the timed competition, the Harker Programming Invitational also hosted a college fair and keynote speakers. Unlike previous years in which only one keynote speaker presented, this year’s invitational had two speakers focusing on artificial intelligence, Chris Manning, a professor of Computer Science and Linguistics at Stanford University, and Angie Krackeler from the IBM Watson team.
This year, 46 teams in total competed. The winning team in the novice division consisted of students from Leland, Dougherty Valley, and Irvington high schools. The winner of the advanced division was a team from Monta Vista high school.
This piece was originally published in the pages of The Winged Post on March 28, 2017.
