USC Chess Club

Just a little while ago, I got back from the USC Chess Club meeting. It was awesome. Not only did I get to play a game of chess (despite showing up late), I also got to talk with Nick Matelli, President of club, and Hendrick (not sure if that’s how his name is spelled), who is working on his Ph.D. in computer science.

It was great just to meet and talk with these older students. We talked about many subjects, ranging from web design to robotics to research. Some of the fields that particularly intrigue me are AI, computer security, video game design, and cinema. The most amazing part, in my opinion, is the tremendous enthusiasm that we all have for math/CS at USC and the opportunities awaiting us in the upcoming school year.

You know the annual programming contest that Google does through TopCoder? Well, apparently USC has its own, smaller competition that also runs through TopCoder. However, it’s sponsored by major video game companies, and anyone who does reasonably well comes away with a free video game. I’ll have to look into it sometime.