HVTechFest Youth Hackathon 2020 Recap

We are super thankful to all of the amazing participants, speakers, mentors, judges and sponsors for being the part of HVTechFestival Youth Hackathon! We hope all of our attendees had a great time — it was fantastic to host so many interesting individuals.

If you missed out, don’t worry! You can now access the full Hackathon Day 1 & Day 2 Livestreams.

The second HVTechFest Youth Hackathon 2020 was held virtually through the online platforms Zoom & Discord on October 23–24th. The theme for the 2020 HVTechFest was Technology & Recovery — Adapting to the New Abnormal.

We kicked off with Special Guest Speaker, Julie Anderson (“Brain Lady”), who discussed people’s varying brain structures as well as accompanying strengths. Design thinking warm up exercises were then given to the youth, who proceeded to pitch 60 second ideas. In the two-day event, creative thinkers as young as 11 years old got to work on their coding and computer science skills creating solutions for Social Distancing, Digital Divide, and Jobs & Workforce Development.

Did you attend the event? If so, give us your feedback.

Highlights

• Over 150 interested attendees and 75 actual participants that joined forces in the Youth Hackathon
• 25 inspiring and unique ideas were pitched by the participants
• Attendees were matched into 8 teams with dedicated mentors from colleges and tech companies
• 13 projects were submitted including 5 submissions from professional developers
• Judges presented 5 awards to the top 5 teams and the audience got to choose their favorite team

Winners

1. The grand prize (and the Audience Award) was awarded to the Space Track team. Jarred Duggal (Syracuse, NY), Taylor Dinardo and Tanner Festa (Suny New Paltz students, NY), Patrick Meaney (Poughkeepsie, NY), Gerard Vinyes (Catalonia), Aidan Young (Canada), Jacob Johnston (Newburgh, NY). They built the SpaceTrack website to help students, particularly those who struggle with executive function, to organize and prioritize tasks in the new virtual environment. Tasks can include courses, social interaction, exercise, and other goal-oriented activities. SpaceTrack includes games, a prioritization calculator, task selector, parent portal, and a VR display, not to mention its awesome space theme!
2. First Runner Up prize went to Jobs for You — A working prototype for providing job opportunities for low-wage workers. It was built by Abhishree Verma — college student from India, and Aarna Patel (11 y.o student from Newburgh School).
3. Best Ed Tech prize sponsored by DataArt was awarded to Remote Learning Wizard. Frangelina Cartagena, Caesar Bell, Lydia Lumbert, Arlo Weston from Poughkeepsie, and Anish Ganesh from India, created a platform where kids can access after school support. Staff assists with homework, everyday tutoring, upcoming exams or having the option of being part of a book club to improve reading and writing skills. Their platform’s mission is to resume access to daily educational support for remote learning changes due to COVID-19.
4. Best Effort Hack prize was awarded to Owl Whistle for Kare — Your Emotional Companion. Tsering Norbu, Hibatallah Kabbaj, Ayoub Rihi — three computer science students from NY and Morocco — built a wise smart coach that can help people during difficult times. Kare is not only interactive but also a proactive application that contains recommendations, menu services such as meditation and music adequate to person behavior.
5. Social Impact award went to Marist Cyber Group Connecting Students and Educators During a Pandemic Through Modern Technology. The award was given to three students from Marist College: Patrick McNamara (Team Lead), DeAnna Singer, and Cole Nielson. These students are senior cybersecurity majors who are currently enrolled in a capstone project which aims to evaluate the impact of the global pandemic on internet privacy. They hope to be able to incorporate the project that they created for the hackathon into their final capstone delivery. See their pitch deck here

Sponsors

HVTechFest wouldn’t be possible without the help and support from our amazing sponsors:

• DataArt
• MediaCom
• Technically Creative
• Ethan Allen Workforce Solutions
• Google Development Group Capital Region
• AI Camp
• ROI Training
• and many more…

HVTechFest Youth Hackathon provides unique approach for problem solving

• Using hi-tech and low-tech functions to solve the public problems
• Teaming professionals together with youth
• Gaining entrepreneurial spirit while introducing collaborative way of problem solving

Get Connected

Here are few ways to get connected to HVTechFest and learn about our future projects and events:

• Visit our HVTechFest website
• Social Media (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram)
• Join our Slack community