Dates: (Every time is PST)
HackMerced IX hacking will run from March 8th, 6pm to March 10, 6am. You will be given an hour to submit your projects after hacking is over in COB1 105. Submissions will be due on March 10th, 7am. Hackers will be given an hour after submissions to get breakfast and recollect their thoughts for the judging period. Judging starts at March 10th, 8am and end at March 10th, 10am. Winners will be announced in the closing ceremony on March 10th, 11am at COB1 102 (auditorium).
Eligibility
Students of any kind are welcome participate in this hackathon. From high schoolers to college students and even self-learners are welcome to participate! You are required to attend this hackathon in-person in order to eligible to submit a project. We will have an attendance system to check to see if you were in this event in-person. Participants are required to follow the MLH Code of Conduct.
Project and Submission Requirements
All project submissions are expected to be submitted after the 'hacking start time' (Mar 8, 6pm) and before the 'submission due date' (Mar 10, 7am). If your project uses ANY form of programming, it is required that you use a web-based version control repository (e.g. GitHub, GitLab) that will be linked in your project submission. These Git repositories must have been created no sooner than 3 hours before hacking start time begins and must have no commits until after the hacking start time. Any highly suspicious version control activity will be relayed to your judges and will affect your ability to win any prizes. You will know if there is any suspicion and if those suspicions are cleared.
Prizes:
Each of the prizes below is x1 for each team member.
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AgTech Track Prizes: (Sponsored by VISTA and Farms Food Future Innovate (F3)) |
Health for Social Good Prizes (Sponsored by CITRIS and the Banatao Institute) |
AgTech Track - 1st Place:
AgTech Track - 2nd Place:
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Health for Social Good Track - 1st Place:
Health for Social Good Track - 2nd Place:
Most Impactful (up to 2 recipients):
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Bonus Prizes: |
Spatial & Interactivity: |
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Best Use of MongoDB Atlas MongoDB Atlas takes the leading modern database and makes it accessible in the cloud! Get started with a $50 credit for students or sign up for the Atlas free forever tier (no credit card required). Along with a suite of services and functionalities, you'll have everything you need to manage all of your data, and you can get a headstart with free resources from MongoDB University! Build a hack using MongoDB Atlas for a chance to win a M5GO IoT Starter Kit for you and each member of your team. Prize: Best Domain Name from GoDaddy Registry: GoDaddy Registry is giving you everything you need to be the best hacker no matter where you are. Register your domain name with GoDaddy Registry for a chance to win a Hack from Home Kit! Each Kit contains wireless earbuds, blue light glasses, selfie ring light and a pouch for easy transport. Prize: Best Use of Auth0 Auth0 wants your applications to be secure! Why spend hours building features like social sign-in, Multi-Factor Authentication, and passwordless log-in when you can enable them through Auth0 straight out of the box? Auth0 is free to try, doesn’t require a credit card, and allows for up to 7,000 free active users and unlimited log-ins. Make your new account today and use any of the Auth0 APIs for a chance to win a pair of wireless headphones and a battery pack for you and each member of your team! Prize: Best DEI Hack sponsored by Fidelity At Fidelity, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion are viewed as major keys to the success of their business, which is why they are challenging you to come up with innovative ways to create forward-thinking financial tech that promotes equality for all people! We want you to use your hacking skills to find and build solutions that put financial opportunities and resources within reach for all communities, creating accessible, sustainable, and/or inclusive solutions. The team with the best hack will win a Fidelity branded wireless charger for each team member! Prize: Best Use of Flow Flow is a public, decentralized, layer-one blockchain designed for creating limitless Web3 apps for mainstream adoption. Flow empowers hackers like you to build decentralized applications and share them with the world. Write safe and readable smart contracts with Cadence and explore the potential of composable, on-chain logic. With SDKs in multiple languages like Javascript, Go, Kotlin, Python, Swift, Unity, you can jump in and start your hack using Flow this weekend for a chance to win $200 USD worth of FLOW token for each member of your team! Prize: Best Use of AI in Education Artificial Intelligence (AI) models, such as large language models (LLMs), are transforming how we interact with computers. During this weekend's hackathon, we want you to apply AI towards improving education to produce tools that support the quality, accessibility, and equitability of learning in today's classrooms. You can use AI to address any challenge teachers and students face, such as curriculum planning, question selection, teacher training, content generation, personalized feedback, automated grading and more.
Prize: |
The power of science is incredible! We can make a lot of things that we've never been able to make before. However, it's important that the technology we make today is interactive and inclusive to all. Things that you can see and that you can touch make a long lasting effect to all of us and drives us to where we are today. Hacks in this track are projects that focus on interactivity and spatial technologies. It isn't limited to just VR/AR but anything that people can play around with! Games included.
Spatial & Interactivity Track - 2nd Place:
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Judging Criteria and Winner Selection:
Projects will be judged in the following categories on a scale from 1-5:
Innovation
The uniqueness of the project's approach, considering how it differs from existing ideas.
Execution
The effectiveness of the project's performance including code quality and functionality.
Impact
The project's potential to address community needs, considering its positive impact on individuals.
Adaptability
The project's ability to adapt to circumstances during development, considering its flexibility to any obstacles.
Collaboration
The level of collaboration among team members, including communication, division of tasks, and problem-solving.
User Experience (UX)
The effectiveness of the project's performance including code quality and functionality.
Pitch
The effectiveness of the team's technical presentation, including their ability to communicate complex ideas and demonstrate the project's technical aspects.
