Austin Diversity Hackathon Was The Best Hackthon EVER

The Austin Diversity Hackathon went from idea to reality in about three weeks — including the combination of enthusiasm, opportunity and available space — nonetheless, we had 80 people show up to our happy hour sponsored by Atlassian and Crystal Creek Moonshine and about 90 folks show up to the actual hackathon at Capital Factory.

We organized the event as a way to bring in people from groups that are underrepresented in technology together and give them a safe and supportive introduction to technology.

Our sponsors for the event made it possible. GoDaddy, Hired, AT&T, Google Fiber, Communication Service for the Deaf, Latino Healthcare Forum, IBM, WeWork, Indeed and BuildASign, allowed us to award a series of prizes — a Rebecca Minkoff notifications bracelet, GoDaddy drones and speakers, a BuildASign messenger bag — and $100 in cash for each of our winners, in addition to breakfast, lunch and dinner for our attendees.

My co-organizers and I told each other anecdotes about our attendees throughout the event and a frequent reaction was, “OMG I’m going to cry.” To say the event was a success would be an understatement.

We were able to put together an IBM Bluemix workshop and a Ruby workshop, thanks to the efforts of Women Who Code Austin Founder Holly Gibson, and Co-Director Tricia McTigrit brought in a good group of mentors to help our hackers troubleshoot. Event Lead Tracy Holmes did everything else basically, including checking folks in and organizing the volunteers, as well as ensuring that the hackathon ran smoothly. And Event Lead Laura Santamaria made sure we left everything spick and span.

Throughout the hackathon folks told us how much fun they were having, thanked us for putting on the event and milled about busily as they put together their projects. One of the most rewarding experiences for me, personally, was seeing that the majority of the winners were first-time hackathon participants. Also, we had one high school student attend, and seeing how proud her family was when her team won actually did bring a tear to my eye.

While I knew the hackathon would be great, the actuality of the event blew away all of my expectations. When I showed up on Saturday morning at 8:30AM and there was already a full room of hackers working I thought “Wow.”

A friend of mine who was watching the hackathon through our #ATXDivHack hashtag texted me — “Your participants are so diverse!” — and I texted her back, “I know right?!” It was such a pleasure and such a surprise not only to see how many people participated, but that people from our target communities participated, and the value of their perspective really shined through in the projects, which included a transgender health app, a social justice/legal app and a diversity news app.

We’re so excited and so grateful to have been a part of such a great event and we’re already planning next year’s hackathon. To all our sponsors and participants, a hearty thank you — see you next year!