Four young Australian women have made their mark on the world stage, receiving three bronze medals and all students solving a whole problem outright (full solve) at the European Girls’ Olympiad in Informatics (EGOI), held in the Netherlands from 21-27 July. It is the first time ever Australia has fielded a team at this competition.
The Australian team placed as follows:
Ayana Fridkin – 50th place (Bronze Medal)
Christina Chen – 65th place (Bronze Medal)
Alexa Wu – 66th place (Bronze Medal)
Honey Raut – 116th place
“Ayana, Christina, Alexa and Honey have worked incredibly hard and have achieved so much. Their results speak for their hard work and dedication, and also help open doors for young women across the country who are interested in developing their problem solving and computer science skills,” said Nathan Ford, AMT CEO.
EGOI, the high-level scientific programming contest, identifies and motivates talented young women of high school age to pursue an education and career in mathematics and informatics. This year’s Olympiad saw over 180 international young women compete to solve algorithmic and problem-solving tasks to foster their technical skills, critical thinking and creativity. The Australian program and team is supported and developed by the Australian Maths Trust (AMT).
“This is Australia’s first year competing at EGOI and we are thrilled with the team’s results. We couldn’t have achieved this without the support of our program staff – Team Leader Paula Tennent, Deputy Angeni Bai, Tour Leader Shayla Nguyen and the leadership of our Director of Training, Angus Ritossa.
“With this result, the Trust now has two clear pathways for young women who want to refine and develop their mathematical skills via our European Girls’ Mathematical Olympiad (EGMO) and EGOI programs. The future is so bright, and we look forward to many more years of success in helping young women achieve their best,” concluded Mr Ford.
The AMT’s 2024 EGOI team were supported by the Trust’s National Sponsor of the Australian Informatics and Mathematical Olympiad Programs, Optiver, and the University of New South Wales.
MEDIA BACKGROUNDER
The European Girls’ Olympiad in Informatics team for 2024 comprised:
Ayana Fridkin, Year 9, Caulfield Grammer School, VIC
Ayana started her journey in informatics as a young child when her dad (who is also a programmer) found a basic Python coding course. Her love of the Python problem solving elements, led her to the AIO. In 2023, Ayana received the top prize in Mathematics and Statistics Research Competition from the University of Melbourne for Using Python/pandas to analyse weather prediction accuracy.
“I am especially looking forward to meeting other female informaticians and hearing about their coding experiences. I’ve never met many very skilled female coders – I could count the number of ones I know on my hands – so that’s the main cause of excitement for me. Of course, I am also looking forward to solving the problems!”
Ayana plans to pursue a programming career, with the goal of starting her own company and building apps with her coding skills. She hopes to create something that benefits society and the environment through raising awareness about global warming or Earths limited resources.
Christina Chen, Year 11, Korowa Anglican Girls’ School, VIC
Christina began coding in primary school, where she participated in multiple competitions with design and technical coding aspects. She is looking forward to meeting girls from other countries who excel in informatics and believes participating in this competition will be a unique opportunity for her to compete with a wider range of competitors from different countries.
In future schooling years, Christina wishes to further her studies in computer science and maths with the hope of working in the technology sector, possibly relating to AI, which has been an interest of hers since year 5.
Honey Raut, Year 12, University High School, VIC
Honey has always enjoyed programming and problem-solving, so it was easy for her to fall in love with informatics. However, it was her experience in a camp meeting of like-minded peers, learning complex algorithms and getting a taste for the real fun of informatics which truly sparked her interest.
“As a young aspiring female informatician, my advice to others would be to try to consistently learn and solve problems. Each solved problem gives you an immediate dopamine rush, and the more you learn, the more problems you can solve. You’ll soon realise that the key to endless happiness is informatics.”
Alexa Wu, Year 8, Pymble Ladies’ College, NSW
As a naturally curious person, Alexa has always been interested in puzzles and problem-solving. Being only in year 8, Alexa hasn’t quite figured out what she would like to focus her futures studies on but knows that she wants to leave the world a slightly better place than how she found it.
“My advice to girls in informatics would be this: trust yourself and give every problem a shot.”
Heading into the EGOI, Alexa is looking forward to meeting other teams, involving her informatics schools and training with her friends – and doing the contest problems, of course.