In July 1992, two UW-Parkside connected race walkers competed in the Summer Olympics in Barcelona; 1989 alumna Michelle Marter-Rohl finished 20th, and Debi Spino-Lawrence, a member of the university's race walking team, finished 26th. Marter-Rohl went on to compete in the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, finishing 14th in the 10k race, the best US finisher. In the fall of 1992, UW-Parkside history professor Thomas Reeves published "A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy", which spent several weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list. Around the same time the university began hosting a national computer Olympics. Coordinated by math professor Donald Piele, the competition is used to pick the United States team to compete in the annual International Olympiad in Informatics. By 1998, UW-Parkside teams had won four gold medals, six silver medals and nine bronze medals.