I’m in Hungary right now, at the WRO 2019 finals, and I’m overwhelmed with pride. In EdTech, people love to talk about “success metrics,” but for me the real metric is when your student outperforms teams from 77 countries around the world.
So, what happened?
Our team from the Moscow Programming School has just taken gold in the most prestigious senior category. We were the only team to score the maximum possible points on both competition days.
Why does this matter (and what does the real IT industry have to do with it)? This season’s theme was Smart Cities. Not just playing with sensors, but deep work in domains that will define tomorrow’s reality:
- Traffic automation and 5G infrastructure
- Energy efficiency and IoT
- Smart building systems
Out of 23,000 teams worldwide, only 424 made it to the finals. And our students proved to be the best of the best.
This is the true mission of the school: to build an environment where talent doesn’t just grow, but starts reproducing expertise. We don’t just teach coding, we build continuity.
My biggest pride isn’t even the medal. It’s the people behind the result. The coach of this team, Maksim Shepelev, is someone who once himself came to our school as a student. I remember him writing the first lines of code. And now he’s mentoring world champions.
Looking at these 12,000 people here in Győr, I’m convinced once again: we’re doing everything right. Investing in children is the only investment in the future with a 100% guaranteed return.
Proud of this team. Proud of the coach.