• All submission requirements should be followed.
  • Teams may only have 1-4 members.
  • Each team member's school name should be specified on the project submission page.
  • Each team can only submit one project. Participants may not be in multiple teams.
  • Teams may not have outside collaborators (especially family members) or participants from other teams contributing directly to their project, although they may seek advice from mentors and peers.
  • Projects must be started and completed within the submission period.
    • We are partnering with the HackMCA event being held simultaneously to allow projects from either event to be submitted to both as long as they are rule-compliant.
  • Your project may use media assets — such as textures/images/sounds/music — from online sources, but they must be appropriately attributed and you must ensure you have the rights to use those resources. We are not responsible for any intellectual property infringements in your projects.
  • Copying another team’s project or submitting an external application without significant original modifications is strictly forbidden.
  • Submitted source code must reasonably match the project shown in the video.
  • Coding must be a significant portion of the development process of your project (at judges' discretion).

    Inadmissible Examples

    Acceptable Examples
    (depending on challenge criteria)
    A digital poster about how technology can help solve environmental issues A website or app created by your team that actually helps solve an environmental issue
    A research report about how peoples' facial expressions correlate to their mood A project that uses a machine learning algorithm to guess the user's mood based on how their face appears in their camera
    A digital drawing/diagram of a website or app An actual website or app your team created
    A custom level for an existing game that simply involved using a graphical interface to create challenges for the player A modification or extension for an existing game requiring real code that creates new functionality or features that change the playing experience
    A Google Slides presentation using links and animations to create an interactive experience A submission using block-based code to create animations, games, or another kind of project on a platform like Scratch or Code.org
  • All participants must be registered both on Devpost and via our registration form.
  • The Hack Code of Conduct will be in effect at the in-person venue.
    • In-person attendees agree to an additional list of terms described in the in-person section of the registration form.

 

Generative AI Policy (ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, etc.)

Given how AI has evolved over the past two years, it is clear that modern programmers will need to learn to use it effectively. As such, the use of generative AI tools and assistants is fully allowed, but with some conditions:

  • Any use of generative AI must be explicitly stated in the project submission page. Participants should give credit to the specific models/tools they used, and if possible, state how they were used. This will not count against the value of the project.
  • Participants must still be able to demonstrate a clear understanding of their own code, especially in the video part of the submission.
  • Participants should NOT use AI to generate any part of the video or written parts of the project submission page.