Challenge

As a community, we all need to adapt to face the challenge that is climate change. We often rely on others to guide us to live greener and to help out our community, but what if we could make a difference ourselves? What if we can make smarter choices that are also the easiest ones? What if we could improve the lives of people around us in need while doing this?

Our hackathon aims to sprout ideas that engage individuals like you. To engage anyone to contribute in any way they can to positively impact climate change, directly or indirectly, through helping communities in need.

Create something engaging that encourages repeat use and instills good habits in people that benefit their communities. We welcome radical, crazy ideas. Be creative!

Ideas to get you started

• I want to identify the places in my neighbourhood where there is a lot of trash (photos of littered places, heat maps, initiatives, tasks, etc.) so that I can go there and take action on my daily walk.
• I want to get in touch with individuals and families in need so that I can cook for someone extra each day.

How to participate

If you're interested in participating in the hackathon, that's awesome! You'll have the chance to meet new people, learn some new skills, and maybe even win some prizes. Check out the timeline below for an overview of what we've got planned.

Please note you will also need to register for CUSEC to participate.

Timeline

Beginning December 4th

• Register
• Sign up individually or in a team of 3-5
• Connect with your team on Discord
• Start brainstorming ideas/hacking!
• Join our Discord server
• Send us your Discord ID during registration
• Communicate with your teammates and other hackers
• Ask RBC and CUSEC volunteers all your questions!

January 4th - Meet The Mentors Day

• Hosted on Discord
• Talk to RBC developers get help with your product and code

• Schedule (EST):
• 1:00 PM: HackaComm Intro
• Competition overview
• Mentor introductions
• Mini prizes
• 1:30 PM - 4:00 PM: Mentor drop-ins
• Students can ask mentors any questions they may have!
• 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM: Social (CUSEC - games)

January 5th - January 7th

• Submit your teams
• Submit your team name and team members
• Share GitHub repo with organizers
• Pitch schedule will be released
• Need to be registered to the hackathon in order to be on Discord.
• Teams can register up until January 7th 23:59:59 PM

January 8th

• Preliminaries: Pitch Day (All Day)
• Pitch to the Judging panel
• Top three teams will be chosen to present during the conference

January 10th

• Final presentations
• Top three teams pitch to the whole conference
• Winners will be announced!

Judging Criteria

Vision: 25/100

• Is your idea feasible in today’s world?
• What kind of impact could this have?

UI/UX Design: 25/100

• How well designed is your solution?
• Has design thinking been applied?

Technology: 25/100

• What technologies does your solution leverage?
• What data are you consuming?
• How are you using tech to solve your problem?

Presentation: 25/100

• How well do you convey your idea?
• Is the problem you’re trying to solve clearly defined?

Prizes

1. First place: Kobo Formas loaded up with some of our favourite books!
2. Runner up prizes: TBD*

*Subject to change