In the past weeks many people have messaged me asking for help/mentoring in competitive programming. I can’t possibly help so many people at the same time but I would like to start an initiative that could be a more efficient way to motivate and teach the new comers.
A few observations I have made over the years:
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Big groups discourage people from asking simple doubts and group is mostly full of spam.
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Any group with a large skill difference normally turns toxic and isn’t helpful to any party involved.
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Motivation is the key factor in success and this can be achieved only when you make friends
So here’s the idea:
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Everyone fill up this Google form which collects basic information.
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I will form groups of 3-4 people who have similar skills and 1 mentor who has a higher skill level. Then each group will form a texting group on Facebook Messenger or wherever they prefer.
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If a group becomes inactive, one can refill the form and I can try and reallocate them.
Link of Form
Please give any suggestions in the comments. I would also love someone who could help me with this initiative.
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First off, congrats for your results in IOI.
This is something I disagree on. If the mentor is of a higher level, its very unlikely that he would continue in the circle for long. As they say, birds of the same feather flock together. Since CP education is a continual process, most likely, the mentor would prefer a group of people with the same level as them, and would’nt be able to dedicate a lot of their time in the other group (there might be some ever-helping coders, but overall, this is not feasible).
A better alternative would be, making a site where people could register with their cf/cc handles and emails. Once they register, they can see the profiles of other coders at the same level. If they want contacts of a particular person to join his/her group, they could send a request to the particular person, and he would review it before giving the other person access to his contact/group link.
But the major problem with this is plagarism. Small groups are usually havens for such activities. From my observations, large groups restrict plagarism in multiple ways, as there would always be someone who would report this behavior (in small groups, determining the betrayer is quite simpler than in bigger groups). But big groups have a lot (and i mean a lot) of spam.
At the end, everything has its own advantages and disadvantages, and in my opinion, self-study and self-practise are the most suitable for beginners. Editorials of cc problems are well detailed and good (Thank @taran_1407 and @vijju123 for this). As your level progresses, you’ll quickly find like-minded programmers with whom you could then collaborate.
In any case, since this is your idea, I believe you have different reasons for the benefits of such groups. Please comment below any conflict of opinions you have, if any. 
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Thanks for the response. What you are suggesting is basically a social network for coders, and is beyond me to create without putting a lot of effort. I agree with the plagiarism problem although I trust the community enough that they will do the right thing. I am sure some lower skilled people will try to cheat although they could have done that before also.
My goal was to motivate people by making them meet people of similisr skilled levels. The role of the mentor would be small, and that is fine. In my opinion, you don’t even need a mentor to help you improve if you have friends of similiar skill level to ask for help. Thanks for your suggestion. Maybe it is a good idea to make a website but I do not have the resources or the time to make something like that right now.
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If people really want to learn they won’t do plagiarism as they are cheating nobody but themselves and it won’t help in the long run.
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I heard somewhere about some ICO preparatory group.Does such group exist.How can I join it??
What about someone who’s only active at CodeChef?
When will the groups be made??
I got an email at 2 P.M today ,regarding the group members and mentor.
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I didn’t get any mail.Maybe will get after some time
The groups have been made but not even a single person is active in the group.
Can my group be reallocated and also my max rating has increased by around 160 on cf.
The form is also not allowing more responses now.How to reapply
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