During her senior year of high school, Caitlin Sanders was involved in her first hackathon, in which she and her team had 24 hours to create an invention of their choosing. The team produced an app that could be used for reporting potential domestic violence incidents, but masqueraded as a fully-functioning food delivery app. 

After the team received three awards, Sanders knew it wouldn’t be her last hackathon.

“I had never been under the conditions of creating something this important in just 24 hours,” said Sanders, a junior at Syracuse University and co-president of Innovate Orange. “This hackathon proved to me that computer science was something I wanted to continue to pursue.”

Innovate Orange will hold its third consecutive CuseHacks from Saturday, Feb. 15 to Sunday, Feb. 16 in the Life Sciences Complex. CuseHacks is a 24-hour hackathon, in which college students work in groups to invent a project that can enact a positive change on society.

Sanders said that she believes CuseHacks acts as a great collaborative experience for not only those interested in computer science, engineering and technology, but for students “from all different fields and colleges.” 

The event itself is sponsored by multiple large organizations, including Google, Major League Hacking and IBM. Professor Jae Oh in the College of Engineering and Computer Sciences said that he was very impressed that many of these organizations were more than willing to help out with CuseHacks, even in its infancy.

“The outreach that we’ve had with engineering and computer science organizations around the country has exceeded all of my expectations,” Oh said. “Originally, I wanted to help connect the students to people in the industry, but since then they’ve taken it upon themselves to get this great help.”

CuseHacks began as a simple conversation between Sanders, her fellow computer science students and Oh. When he was originally approached by the students about holding their own hackathon at SU, he could simply not turn down their determination. 

Since then, he has served as the faculty advisor of Innovate Orange and a judge of the past two CuseHacks. Innovate Orange is a student organization that aims to promote interest technology and programming. The group started after the first hackathon at SU and became a registered student organization to continue the annual event. 

“I hadn’t really been involved in any other hackathon before CuseHacks,” Oh said. “But when these students, my students, explained this event to me, I could see their passion — I could see their drive. And thus, with collaboration between us, the school, and our sponsors, CuseHacks was born.”

At the first CuseHacks in 2018, volunteers organized workshops that enabled the students to participate in workshops that delved into hardware and coding basics. This year, Innovate Orange will be holding a workshop called CuseHacks Jr. on the second day of the hackathon, featuring three workshops for the students, including one on hardware, website building and even a “tech talk” from representatives at Google.

A big aspect of CuseHacks has been the organizers’ willingness to teach college students about the world of coding, engineering and computer science, but the hackathon also holds special events for local middle school students as well. 

Olivia Flynn, a student in the computer sciences program at SU and the secretary of Innovate Orange, has been involved with CuseHacks since the beginning. She believes that these workshops for the younger students are vital to showing them all of the innovations that engineers and computer scientists are capable of.

“I think it’s very valuable for the students to see our enthusiasm about our discipline through CuseHacks,” Flynn said. “We hope to inspire them, that they can make anything they set their minds to using technology and coding.”

All projects created by CuseHacks participants aim to better the lives of people through the use of technology. Although many have been memorable, both Flynn and Oh agreed that one has stuck with them over the years. Flynn recalls one group’s efforts to create an app that used image processing that alerted visually impaired users if there was an obstacle in their path.

Oh added that the growth of CuseHacks in just the past two years has exceeded his expectations. The organizers of the event have taken it upon themselves to utilize their connections and get assistance for the event from various local organizations.

“It’s amazing to see the types of things people can create in just 24 hours” Flynn said. “All they need is an idea, and the rest takes off from there.”

 

Published on February 11, 2020 at 8:56 pm