What is the USA Computing Olympiad?
The USA Computing Olympiad (USACO) is one of the most prestigious high school programming contests in the nation. It consists of a series of online programming contests designed to identify and nurture talented high school students interested in computer science and algorithmic problem-solving.
Why compete in USACO?
The main three benefits of competing in USACO are a boost to college applications, career advancement, and improving general problem-solving skills. For a comprehensive guide on how USACO can fit into your journey, check out one of our other blogs here.
1. Strengthening College Applications with USACO
Excelling in USACO competitions can significantly strengthen your college application. A majority of USACO Finalists end up attending MIT, and many others matriculate at top schools like Stanford, Harvard, and Princeton. Competitors who qualify for the Platinum or Gold division also tend to experience a significant boost to their college application.
2. Career Advancement through USACO Training
Technical software engineering job interviews often test the same concepts and skills as USACO does. Practicing USACO in high school means that you’ll have a head start in preparing for internship and job interviews after high school. Additionally, listing a strong USACO achievement on your resume can be helpful especially for recruitment from quantitative finance firms, which often look for former CS and Math olympiad competitors.
3. Developing Problem-Solving Skills via USACO
USACO helps you develop general problem solving skills, which can be applicable to any field or career you end up choosing.
How is USACO Structured?
USACO is divided into 4 divisions, with each division introducing more concepts and increasing in difficulty:
Bronze
Silver
Gold
Platinum
All participants begin in the Bronze division. Once they pass a certain score threshold in a contest, they are promoted to the Silver division. Participants remain in the Silver division until they reach Gold, where they compete to finally reach Platinum. There is never a risk of “demoting” to a lower division.
Among competitors in the Platinum division, 16-24 of the best-performing students are invited to participate in the USACO Training Camp. Among these students, 4 students are ultimately selected to compete in the International Olympiad for Informatics (IOI). Additionally, 4-7 female-identifying students are invited to the training camp, where 4 of them will be selected to compete in the European Girl’s Olympiad in Informatics (EGOI). Participation in the EGOI or IOI is one of the most prestigious accomplishments that a high school student can achieve.
How do USACO Contests work?
Every season consists of four contests: the December Contest, January Contest, February Contest, and US Open. The US Open is typically held either during the end of March or beginning of April, and is considered the hardest contest. All contests are held on weekends from Friday to Monday, where competitors can choose to compete during any 4-hour time window they want (5 hours for the US Open).
Every contest has separate problem sets for each division. Each division presents three questions, each worth 333 points. Your score for a particular problem is calculated as 333 multiplied by the percentage of test cases you pass. If you manage to achieve a perfect score on all problems, you obtain a total score of 1000 and receive an in-contest promotion. For participants who don't attain a full score, those who score above a certain threshold (typically ranging from 700 to 800), announced after the contest, are promoted to the next division.
How Do I Register for USACO?
Students can register for an account on the official USACO website: http://usaco.org/. Once a student has created an account, they will be able to participate in all of the upcoming competitions.
How Do I Get Started?
There’s a lot of information as to where to begin, this video covers some great information for beginners. Alternatively, we also have a comprehensive blog post on the intricacies of getting started.
What Resources Should I Use?
A comprehensive list of resources available can be found on the USACO Resources Page. In general, the most effective resources for preparation are as follows:
USACO Guide - A comprehensive guide authored by USACO Finalists. It includes topics to learn and problems to practice for each division.
USACO Past Contests - Contains a list of all past contents and problems since 2012.
Codeforces - Offers a lot of competitive programming contests for additional practice outside of USACO.
Free VPlanet Courses - Provides a categorized list of Codeforces problems for guided practice in each division beyond USACO questions.
Outside of the 4 core resources, other resources for learning include taking free online college algorithms courses, Youtube videos, and algorithms textbooks.
Can I Get Coaching From VPlanet Coding?
Yes you can! Once you know how to code, we have programs starting from USACO Bronze all the way up to USACO Platinum. If you’re super busy, then you need our program, so that you can advance faster and spend your time more efficiently. If you can get half your time back, then all those remaining hours can be spent on something else to make your college apps that much more competitive.
Here are 5 key benefits that we provide over other alternatives:
Comprehensive curriculum for each USACO division
VPlanet provides dozens of hours of video content with in-depth algorithms and problem walkthroughs, covering all the knowledge a student needs to know to become successful. Additionally, our curriculum teaches the essential problem-solving skills that are required beyond the knowledge of algorithms.
Carefully curated problems
Practicing on your own can be frustrating and inefficient. We know what it’s like to spend 2 hours thinking through a problem just to give up and read a solution you can barely understand. VPlanet has handpicked 100+ problems for each division, ensuring that the problems students work on are never too easy or too hard. We guarantee that each problem has just the right level of difficulty to optimize students’ improvement trajectory.
Daily support from coaches
If students are ever stuck or confused, VPlanet provides daily support in the form of Facebook group discussions, Q&A, and one-on-one sessions with highly-experienced coaches. These sessions maintain a very small ratio between students and coaches to ensure that everyone receives as much personalized help as possible.
In contrast, a typical USACO class can have as many as 30 students assigned to one teacher, with only 1-2 class sessions per week to ask for help. This class environment makes it difficult to ask for help and risks leaving many students behind.
Work at your own pace
An inevitable issue with USACO classes is that they fail to account for each student’s individual skill level. This issue guarantees that either a significant number of students are falling behind in class, or the class is too slow for many high-achieving students. VPlanet overcomes this issue, enabling students to go at the pace they want with regular support from coaches.
Advance faster through USACO
We find that VPlanet students tend to advance at a much faster pace than others. Our carefully crafted curriculum and sessions with coaches provides just the right amount of content and personalized support for students to improve as fast as possible. This leaves our students with more time to focus on other activities to strengthen their college applications.
What Programming Language Should I Compete With for USACO?
When you’re starting out in USACO’s Bronze division, compete with the language you’re most familiar with! After reaching Silver, however, it’s recommended that you use Java or C++ because Python can occasionally be too slow for certain problems. In Gold and Platinum, Java and C++ both remain great choices. However, after reaching USACO Camp, it’s recommended to switch to C++ because it’s the only supported language for the IOI.
For a comprehensive guide on getting started with USACO, check out our blog post here.
How do I advance from USACO Bronze to Silver?
Passing USACO’s Bronze division is doable for anyone with basic programming knowledge and solid problem solving skills.
In terms of basic programming knowledge, a Bronze competitor needs to understand variables, control statements, loops, arrays, and recursion. Beyond understanding time complexity and how to use the built-in sort function, no additional algorithms knowledge is required to pass Bronze. However, knowing how to use basic data structures like dynamic lists, sets, and maps can often be helpful for a variety of problems.
The main challenge of passing Bronze is developing strong problem solving skills. Problem solving is not something that can be easily learned – it requires extensive practice. The best way to improve is to solve as many problems from past contests as possible. The newer contests are usually harder, so if you’re just starting out it’s recommended to start with the problems from the 2015-2016 contest season and gradually work your way to newer contests. The USACO Guide also provides a solid list of categorized problems with difficulty labels for more guided practice.
How do I advance from USACO Silver to Gold?
Passing USACO’s Silver division is not easy, but can be achieved through consistent learning and practice. Beyond the concepts covered in Bronze, Silver tests introductory algorithmic concepts and data structures. These include (but are not limited to):
Binary search
Ordered sets and maps
Prefix sums
Advanced recursion
Graphs and graph traversals (depth-first search and breadth-first search)
Floodfill
Greedy algorithms
Two pointer and sliding window techniques
Beyond knowledge of the above concepts, Silver also requires significantly stronger problem-solving skills. In Bronze, the most obvious brute force solution is typically sufficient to solve a problem. In Silver, however, the brute force solution almost never works, and it is up to the competitor to identify where repetitive work is being done and to leverage certain algorithms and data structures to increase efficiency. This problem-solving cannot be learned, and must be developed through consistent practice with past problems.
How do I advance from USACO Gold to Platinum?
After reaching USACO’s Gold division, competitors will already have developed strong problem solving skills. As such, the main differentiator between Silver and Gold problems is a strong conceptual understanding of more advanced algorithms and strong instincts on when each should be applied. Frequently tested algorithms and data structures include:
Dynamic programming
Shortest path algorithms (Djikstra’s, Bellman-Ford, Floyd-Warshall)
Union Find
Topological sort
Minimum spanning tree algorithms (Kruksal’s, Prim’s)
Segment trees / binary-indexed trees
Combinatorics