From Kindergarten Coding to Gold at IOI

Congratulations to Nathan for winning a gold medal and placing 12th in the world this year, after achieving silver in his second year and bronze in his first. Alongside hundreds of students from around the world, Nathan successfully tackled complex algorithmic and programming challenges.

“It’s thrilling to compete on the world stage,” said Nathan. “It’s a rare opportunity by nature. It feels very special and awesome to compete internationally, and experiencing this scale of competition.”

He started his informatics journey in Kindergarten by learning Python. In Year 7, he started practising on the Australian training site for informatics, and by Year 9 he was ready to join the national training camp. In Year 10, much to his surprise, he was selected to join the Australian IOI team.

“The competition itself was memorable, but more memorable was the fun times I had with the people from other countries,” Nathan said. “I got to meet so many like-minded new friends from the United States, China, United Kingdom, New Zealand and lots of other countries. I’d say to younger Knox students, you never know if you’ll enjoy something until you try it. If you like maths, solving problems or playing games, then try informatics. Even if you don’t make IOI, you’ll still make lots of friends and learn skills that will stay with you.

“The most interesting part is coming up with algorithms that solve the problems in a short amount of time. It’s very easy to come up with a solution that works, but for some problems the slowest solution might take anywhere from minutes to years to finish running! There’s a time limit of a few seconds for each problem, so the real challenge is to make sure your solution is fast enough.

“This is important in real-world scenarios when large amounts of data are handled, with your program processing billions of numbers a second. For example, large language models (LLMs) rely on lots of calculation to be done. Optimising these algorithms can increase the quality of experience for users and allow things that weren’t possible before to be achieved.”

Nathan also shared his experience of Uzbekistan: “Lots of infrastructure was being constructed since Uzbekistan is pushing to be more technologically advanced. The host committee also organised the competition exceptionally well; the accommodation, contest venue and food were all great. There were so many volunteers. They were even able to speed us through customs at the airport, which we thought was pretty impressive!”