About
LACC 2023
Application acceptances for 2023 have been sent out.
The application form is still open for late applications and additional acceptances will be sent out on a rolling basis as spots open up. For application details please check here.
The program will take place online over Zoom from 7/10-7/20, and at UCLA on 7/21 (voluntary)
LACC-2023, we selected a group of 76 students from 46 different schools.
LACC-2022, we selected a group of 70 students from 42 different schools.
LACC-2021, we selected a group of 57 students from 30 different schools.
LACC-2020, we selected a group of 35 students from 27 different schools
Are you a high school student interested in learning more about Computer Science and Engineering, or a high school teacher interested in providing your students with challenging opportunities? The Los Angeles Computing Circle is an outreach program organized, supervised, and mentored by faculty members and graduate student volunteers from UCLA's Computer Science Department and Electrical & Computer Engineering Department. With the objective of engaging and mentoring younger students for careers in computing and engineering, LACC provides incoming Grade 10-12 students (i.e. those who have completed Grade 9) an opportunity to learn advanced concepts in computing via lectures and hands-on design and programming laboratories. LACC participants become a part of a close-knit community of UCLA research faculty and graduate students who have volunteered their time to create and run LACC.
Program Description
We do not charge any fees from program participants. LACC is a summer program organized as a sequence of self-contained modules on various computing topics and consisting of lectures followed by a hands-on design or programming mini-project, and occasional guest lectures on various topics by researchers from local universities and laboratories.
Starting with its inaugural offering that took place from June 27 to August 19, 2011, with a group of eight students, LACC had its most recent offering in July 2023, with a cohort of 76 students from 46 different schools.
The Philosophy behind LACC
LACC is designed to complement and go beyond the more abstract exposure to computing that the traditional high school computer science curriculum offers by way of AP Computer Science and related courses. Instead of an abstract focus on a specific programming language such as Java, LACC seeks to put computing in the context of its real-world applications, its algorithmic foundations, and the relationship of software to the underlying computing hardware substrate. As such, instead of focusing on language features, LACC modules and projects expose students to topics such how algorithms and programming come together to create systems, such as search engines and social networks that mine and analyze relationships among data and people on the Internet; cyber-physical systems such as robots that interact with the environment via sensors, actuators, and real-time software; networked computing systems such as mobile phones that communicate with other nodes on the internet; and, signal processing systems that process, manipulate, and make inferences from audio, video, and other types of physical data.
How to apply?
The applications form for LACC 2023 is still open for late applications. Late applications will be considered on a rolling basis as spots open up. Please apply here.
Given the nature of LACC program requiring laboratory and graduate student resources, we are able to accept only a limited number of participants. To be considered for participation in LACC, you should be entering 10th, 11th, or 12th grades next Fall, have a GPA of at least 3.0, and have an excellent record in science and mathematics. LACC challenges students beyond what most high schools offer and is not a remedial program. Applicants should have a strong interest in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), particularly computing, in order to benefit from LACC. Some prior experience in programming and/or electronics is beneficial but is not required.
The program is open to all eligible students. We especially encourage participation by students from LAUSD schools, female students, and students from backgrounds under-represented in STEM.
We do not charge any fees from program participants, but we are also unable to provide financial assistance for travel, lodging, and other personal costs that you may incur for participation in LACC.
LACC Organizers
The UCLA faculty behind LACC are Professors Puneet Gupta, Mani Srivastava, Lara Dolecek, Nader Sehatbakhsh, and Yang Zhang. LACC started under the umbrella of the Variability Expedition, a large multi-year multi-university research project funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) and co-led by UCLA. As part of the Variability Expedition, Professor Dolecek, Gupta, and Srivastava's research groups developed new types of computers architected to cope with challenges of high cost, energy inefficiency, and low reliability that occur as the semiconductor devices using which computers are made shrink into the nanoscale regime. While the Variability Expedition project is now over, LACC is continuing with continuing support coming from sources such as the NSF Roseline CPS Frontier Project and the NSF SaTC Project Privacy-Aware Trustworthy Control as a Service for the Internet of Things. LACC 2020 is also funded by the UCLA Computer Science Department. Critical to LACC are also the many graduate and undergraduate student volunteers who have helped develop and deliver the lecture material and design exercises for various modules, and supervised the research projects.
Recent Participants
