ITE Team places 3rd in Mindanao-Wide IT Quiz Tournament

by : Catherine Remolleno

“It was an unexpected win!”

This was the comment of Mr. Exander Barrios when three seniors from the Information Technology Education (ITE) Program of this university bagged the 2nd runner-up spot in the 2nd Mindanao-Wide Tertiary Schools IT Quiz Tournament, July 14, at SM Supermall, Cagayan de Oro City.

Lagging behind in the easy and average rounds, ranking only at ninth place, Mechelle Dimas, BSCS – 4, Katherine Dacanay, and Mary Grace Ignacio, both BSIT – 4, beat the odds with an almost perfect score in the difficult round, slowly advancing to the 4th rank.

They made it to the championship round with Liceo de Cagayan University ranking first, MSU – IIT in the 2nd place, NORMISSIST in the third, and Ateneo de Zamboanga University tailing behind at fifth place. The UIC ITE Team gained the third spot after the tie-breaking question in the championship round.

Coach Barrios was confident that the team, who was also the sole representative of the whole Region XI, would make it to the top five. Without any formal training, the contestants solely depended on each other’s individual expertise in the different fields of IT, battling it out with sixteen other schools and universities all over Mindanao. They brought home 2,000 Php each, plaques, certificates, an HP printer for the school, and Accenture freebies.

Among the topics covered in the competition were Data Communications and Network, Operating System, Programming Languages, Database, Data Structures and Software Analysis and Design. Oro Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Sticky Media Solutions, Inc and STI – Cagayan de Oro organized the event.

It can be recalled that the UIC Team ranked fifth during last year’s competition with Roy Manseras and Mechelle Dimas as participants. The whole program is looking forward to “really getting the bacon; be champions” said Mr. Barrios, in the coming 2008 Mindanao-Wide IT Quiz Tournament.