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Ukrainian schoolchildren contribute to the development of cyber technologies

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IT specialists initiated a project for unmanned aircrafts and organized a unique competition among senior schoolchildren from different cities of Ukraine.

Hackathon participants were 13 eleventh-graders and two tenth-graders from Dnipro, Ivano-Frankivsk, and Drohobych. They had to create software to enhance Ukrainian intelligence activities. This was reported by the hackathon organizers at a press briefing held at Ukraine Crisis Media Center.

According to Ivan Rodichenko, volunteer, founder and director of “Geoserver” project, now UAV-taken photos “are hand-processed, piece by piece.” “Geoserver” developments are innovating because “every photo is linked to the exact coordinates and all photos are systematized according to where they were taken.” In order to attract human resources, “Geoserver” project participants decided to organize a hackathon among schoolchildren. Ivan Rodichenko noted that all organizers were impressed by the pupils’ preparation. According to him, “young people showed tremendous work.” The schoolchildren managed to create software that can improve the quality of storing UAV-taken photos.

The participants demonstrated the original ideas and quality of solving mathematical problems. In particular, Oleksandr Vinnyk, specialist of company “Ciklum”, “Geoserver” expert on software development and calculations, said that he was impressed by the variety of approaches in solving the problems. Speakers mentioned the shortcomings of the education system in Ukraine consisting in the fact that “it sets too abstract problems before pupils.” “It was unusual for the students to solve a real complex problem that had to be split into parts, solve them and then combine,” said Oleksandr Vinnyk. “Given the potential of gifted children, they should learn professional rather than static programming,” noted Serhii Ischeriakov, director of the program “Student-Programmer.”

The “Hackaton” winners were invited to take part in “Geoserver” project to develop cybertechnologies. “This is a unique project that can raise aerial reconnaissance to a totally new level and combine many individual crews into a single reconnaissance drone fleet,” noted Yehor Goriachkin, site manager of company “Ciklum.”

The project has already been presented at the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, and the latter is interested in its further development.