A team of students from the Harbor Space technological university in Barcelona has ranked fourth in the world and first in the European Union in the International University Programming Competition (ICPC) competition, in which some of the universities participate. most prestigious in the world. The Barcelona center, located in the Olympic Village, has 500 students from 55 countries, who study with an intensive system based on technology and mathematics specialties.
The Harbor Space team that attended the ICPC final, held in the Egyptian city of Luxor for four days, was made up of Batyr Sardarbekov (21 years old) from Kazakhstan and a Computer Science graduate; Sergei Zolotarev (24 years old) from Russia and graduate in Data Sciences; and Yahor Dubovik (24 years old) from Belarus and Master in Data Sciences. The coach, Polish Kamil Debowski, is a professor at Harbor Space and an expert in competitive programming, algorithms and data structures.
The founder and CEO of Harbor Space, the Ukrainian Svetlana Velikanova, highlighted in a statement that the Harbor Space team that has participated in the contest “is the first in Europe, Spain and Catalonia to achieve such notable results.” “This monumental achievement not only marks a historic moment for our institution, but also represents an important leap forward in our immediate technological landscape,” she added.
At Harbor Space the academic year consists of 15 modules of three weeks each. The approach is that students complete immersion in each module throughout the day. All classes are taught in English. The teachers are world experts in their respective subjects who come to Barcelona for stays of those three weeks, although in some cases there are also some online classes.
Harbor Space was founded in 2015 by Svetlana Velikanova, Kamran Elahian and Ingo Beyer von Morgenstern. The name was chosen because its first headquarters were in Barcelona’s Port Vell, before moving to the current headquarters in Vila Olímpica. In addition to the Barcelona campus, Harbor Space has another in Bangkok (Thailand), created in 2019 based on an agreement with the University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce (UTCC), which offers an official degree according to its own program.
In Catalonia, Harbor Space has an agreement with the Universitat de Vic-Universitat Central de Catalunya (UVic-UCC) for a Master’s degree in Business Transformation and Innovation. Stanford University (California, United States) also offers students at the Barcelona center a certificate of completion of professional development.