KT, AI Coding Competition... Grand Prize Goes to 3rd Grader Im Doyun's 'Environmental Vending Machine'

KT held the awards ceremony for the '2021 KT AI Coding Competition' at the KT Songpa Building in Songpa-gu, Seoul. (From left in the photo) Songmin Lee, a student at Sanwoon Elementary School in Seongnam-si, Gyeonggi; Doyun Lim, a student at Ilgok Elementary School in Gwangju; Jaeho Song, Vice President of KT AI/DX Convergence Business Division; Kanghyun Nam, a student at Chimsan Elementary School in Daegu; and Jiyeon Hong, team leader of the Elementary Computing Teachers Association, are posing for a commemorative photo. Photo by XXX

[Asia Economy Reporter Seulgi Na Cho] KT announced on the 25th that it held the award ceremony for the ‘2021 KT Artificial Intelligence (AI) Coding Competition’ at the KT Songpa Building in Songpa-gu, Seoul.

KT selected elementary school students to receive coding education in order to discover and nurture future software talents, and conducted online education from the 7th to the 14th.

This competition was held by providing missions to 24 elementary students who completed the education, allowing them to freely solve problems using KT’s ‘KT AI Coding Block.’ KT AI Coding Block is KT’s software coding education platform that enables easy learning and implementation of world technologies such as ‘Artificial Intelligence,’ ‘Internet of Things,’ and ‘Big Data.’

The mission theme of the KT AI Coding Competition was the ‘World Rescue Mission,’ which involved discovering and solving problems based on the ‘2021 Global Risks Report’ announced by the World Economic Forum (WEF). Brilliant ideas emerged across various fields, from ideas to overcome COVID-19 such as quarantine and hygiene to climate change prevention promotion programs.

The judges, composed of four elementary school teachers, evaluated creativity, relevance to the theme, and completeness to announce the award winners. There was one winner each for the Grand Prize, Excellence Award, and Merit Award.

The Grand Prize was awarded to Lim Do-yoon, a 3rd grader at Ilgok Elementary School in Gwangju Metropolitan City. This student developed an ‘Environmental Vending Machine’ that, based on video recognition supervised learning, checks whether the label on a PET bottle has been removed and gives gifts such as notebooks and pencils when empty PET bottles with labels removed are collected. In particular, this program received high scores from the judges in creativity and completeness.

Additionally, the Excellence Award went to Nam Kang-hyun, a 6th grader at Chimsan Elementary School in Daegu Metropolitan City, for the ‘Life Helper’ program, and the Merit Award was given to Lee Song-min, a 6th grader at Sanun Elementary School in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, for the ‘Saving the Earth with AI KT Drone’ program. Detailed results and introductions of the works from this KT AI Coding Competition can be found on the KT AI Coding Block website.

Hong Ji-yeon, team leader of the Elementary Computing Teachers Association and chairperson of the KT AI Coding Competition judging panel, said, “Since AI is highly likely to lead change and innovation in the future society, attractive tools that allow young students to learn easily and enjoyably are necessary,” adding, “In this competition, KT AI Coding Block demonstrated its potential as a tool for students to contemplate world problems and propose solutions.”

Song Jae-ho, Vice President and Head of KT AI/DX Convergence Business Division, said, “I am very proud of the students who grew as AI coding talents by defining and solving problems themselves in the KT AI Coding Competition,” and added, “KT will continue to explore ways to make AI and software easy to understand and efficiently educate, striving to nurture future talent in Korea.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.