Lucid Programming Competition
Join us for the 10th annual Lucid Programming Competition on October 29th. Compete against students from universities across the U.S. The top 30 winners will get Amazon gift cards ranging from $50 to $300. It's always a good time—you won't want to miss it!

Programming Competition
Event details
Date and time
Saturday, October 29, 2022
9:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. MDT
11:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. EDT
CLICK HERE TO JOIN NOW
Participating Universities
Join students from across the county in the competition. The competition is open to all current university students. Some of the universities represented are:
In-person and virtual (see section on "In-person Campuses" below):
- Brigham Young University (BYU)
- University of Utah (U of U)
- Utah State University (USU)
Virtual Only:
- Duke
- Georgia Tech (GA Tech)
- North Carolina State University (NCSU)
- Oregon State University (OSU)
- University of Michigan (Michigan)
- University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC Chapel Hill)
- University of North Carolina at Charlotte
- University of Washington Seattle
- All other Universities
Register
Complete this form to secure your spot in the competition:
Free stuff
- This year’s competition t-shirt (guaranteed for those who complete at least 1 problem and provide a shipping address upon registration)
- $500+ in raffle prizes (all participants will be entered into the raffle automatically)
Schedule
9:00 a.m. MDT (11:00 a.m. EDT) Kick-off meeting over Zoom
9:15 a.m. MDT (11:15 a.m. EDT) Ready, set, go!
Code like crazy
1:15 p.m. MDT (3:15 p.m. EDT) Time’s up!
Take a short break
1:25 p.m. MDT (3:25 p.m. EDT) Prize raffle, winners announced, and solutions revealed
Competition details
Rules
- The competition is open to all current university students.
- Students will compete individually.
- Participants will have 4 hours to solve as many problems as they can.
About the problems
- Participants will receive at least 10 problems, ranging in difficulty from very easy to hard. The problems will be ordered randomly, not based on difficulty.
- Problems will be online in HackerRank and must be submitted through HackerRank.
- Participants can use any programming language, as long as it's supported by HackerRank.
- All problems will use standard input and output.
- Each problem will define the following:
- Known test cases. Solutions can be run and re-run against these known test cases without any penalties.
- Unknown test cases. Solutions will be graded based on these test cases upon submission.
- A time limit. Solutions will time out and fail if not completed within the specified time limit. Algorithms may need to be optimized if submissions are timing out.
Scoring
- The participant who correctly solves the most problems within the allotted 4 hours will win the competition.
- In the case of a tie, the winner will be determined by the lowest cumulative time to solve each problem. (Note: A 20-minute penalty will be added for each incorrect submission on problems that were eventually solved.)
Prizes
The top 30 participants will take home Amazon gift cards! Prizes range from $50 to $300
In-Person Campuses
This year we will provide an in-person option for students at BYU, U of U, and USU. For these universities:
- We will provide breakfast and lunch at each of these locations.
- Students competing in person can bring their own laptop to use or can use a lab computer provided by the university.
- If students at these universities prefer not to compete in person, they can still participate virtually.
Look out for emails closer to the event with details about the location.
Campus locations:
- BYU: TMCB 1170
- U of U: CADE lab
- USU: ESLC 046