The entire hackathon team L-R Hannah Rudin, Amy Kim, Alex Sands, Sebastian Lerner, Mayank Jain, Ani Chandra, Peter Andringa and Jeevan Karamsetty

©Hannah Rudin

 

A Hackathon

Computer Science freshman Mayank Jain made a legacy for himself at his alma mater high school this year. He organized a hackathon competition at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, or TJHSST, a public institution that offers an extensive science and mathematics curriculum. Having seen a few college hackathons upon coming to the University of Illinois he thought about how the event could be applied to high school students who would benefit from the application of computer science skills alongside the creativity encouraged by the open ended competitions.

“It’s been in the news a lot lately that every student should learn how to code. People were talking about it but I didn’t see anyone doing anything about it.” Jain took it upon himself to do something, and through his contribution to the event’s existence and success he directly encouraged learning and excitement amongst the students. The hackathon, Hack TJ, began Friday April 26th at 5:00PM and ran 24 hours until the judging and award ceremony on Saturday April 27th.

Inspiration and Planning

The first hackathon that Jain attended was hosted by Illinois early his freshman year, and while he was enticed by the free food, he stuck around to tinker on a project and watch the award ceremony. It was the award ceremonies of that and subsequent competitions that captivated Jain. “Seeing what other people have built can really expand what you think is possible to make in 24 hours.” He enjoyed participating as well, and while he didn’t go with hopes of winning, he set personal goals for himself every time.

“I like to go in with the intention of teaching myself something new.” It’s that optimism and interest in gaining new skills that Jain hoped to bring out in high school students through his hackathon, which he structured around learning and innovation rather than competition and recruiting.

To implement the hackathon, Jain teamed up with friend Alex Sands. Sands was on the Future Business Leaders of America exec board with Jain when he was a high school student and succeeded Jain as president after Jain graduated. The two spent months planning the hackathon, Jain working from campus to enlist mentors and sponsors while Sands dealt with ground support such as applying for approval from the school and leading fundraising.

They were successful on all fronts. Jain earned support from companies like Facebook and Palantir and Sands, with other students’ help, was able to raise $8,000 for the event. When the big weekend arrived, 137 students participated and Jain was blown away by how well the event unfolded.

“I was really impressed by how much the high school students were capable of and how well it went. Sometimes you have this picture in your head of how something can go under perfectly, and most of time reality falls short of your expectations. This time the students learned so much more from the mentors and were so much more excited than I anticipated. It beat my expectations. ”

A participant being helped by a mentor during the hackathon.

©Hannah Rudin

Rules and Prizes

While the event was orchestrated to focus on learning rather than competition, there were still rules to follow and prizes distributed. Students could work alone or in groups of up to five members. They had to work within the 24 hour time constraint on absolutely any project that came to mind as long as it was a new idea- original and something they hadn’t started prior to the event.

Unlike coding competitions wherein participants are working under strict parameters without help, in hackathons outside input is allowed. To facilitate learning, the aid of developers and mentors was encouraged and the students leaned on their advice. While networking was not a primary focus, the mentors and students got along famously and students were encouraged to contact the developers after the competition.

There were three major prizes as well as merchandise with tech brand names available to all participants. The grand prize was a Samsung Galaxy Tablet and a trip to the University of Pennsylvania to participate in the PennApps hackathon, all sponsored by Palantir.

MapifyTJ was the winning idea, and is roughly similar to the Marauders Map in Harry Potter. It’s a social networking app that allows you to locate friends and teachers within the high school, as well as send messages and publish class schedules.

Jain was most impressed by the second place winning idea WebVirt, which created a virtual machine on the web. For their efforts the team received urBeats by Dre.

Coming in third was Plydraw, a game wherein friends compete against one another by drawing crude pictures based on a concept from the game’s random topic generator. One friend judges the game, and the winner judges the next round. They were awarded a Roku Player XD.

What Lies Ahead?

One aspect of the hackathon that Jain wished he could have changed was the diversity of students involved in the competition. Originally He and Sands both wanted to organize a hackathon that included all local high schools in the D.C. area, but they could not get the necessary approval.

As TJHSST is a magnet school pulling students from the entire northern Virginia area the high school is on its own diverse. Still, the opportunity is novel and something that Jain doesn’t want to limit just to one school of students. He aspires to see more and more students benefiting from the learning atmosphere of a hackathon early in their lives.

To open up the event he may look into renting a different venue for next year so that there are fewer limitations to contend with as there were in the public school setting. Also, Jain is in the beginning stages of working with an undergrad from the University of Pennsylvania who wants to organize a similar hackathon for Philadelphia area high school students.

For More Information

http://www.connectionnewspapers.com/news/2013/apr/03/hackathon-promote-invention/

http://www.tjhsst.edu/studentlife/publications/tjtoday/wordpress/?p=4807