Schools
Student Brings 'Hackathon' To Alpharetta High School
The event, which was held Oct. 10, was part of Local Hack Day, where students worked to find ways to improve upon ideas or products.
---
The term “hack” often brings to mind an unauthorized systems breach, but in modern terms, it describes the use of innovation to create something incredible using multiple technologies.
Find out what's happening in Alpharetta-Miltonfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Think about “Life Hacks” – the social media posts that show how normal daily activities can be made easier through others’ ingenuity.
Joining in this movement, more than 100 students across Fulton County came together on Saturday, Oct. 10, for a “Hackathon” at Alpharetta High School. The event was part of Local Hack Day, an international 12-hour mini-hackathon where students worked individually or in teams to find ways to improve upon products or ideas. Alpharetta’s hackathon was held from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.
Find out what's happening in Alpharetta-Miltonfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
“A hackathon is a magical event where students spend hours and hours learning how to transform an idea into reality. It’s about learning new things, coming up with creative solutions using technology, and showing everything off to peers and friends,” said Anthony Liu, the Alpharetta High School senior in charge of organizing the local event.
Anthony says that hackathons are commonly held at top-tier colleges, such as MIT, Stanford, Harvard and Georgia Tech, and are often considered like an internship fair or career fair since they get the attention of the nation’s top IT employers who attend to meet the hackathon’s most talented students. Similarly, some colleges take notice of high school hackathons as a way to discover potential applicants.
Anthony became interested in creating a local high school hackathon after feeling that the Atlanta area, which has so much tech potential among its high school students, was still lagging behind its peers on the West Coast or Northeast. He aspires to help the Atlanta area become the Silicon Valley of the South.
The high school senior recruited sponsors to fund the event, including Major League Hacking, HackStart, Code.org and Fulton County Schools, as providers of food and drinks to its participants.
Another headlining sponsor, Georgia Tech’s College of Computing, also had students on hand to mentor the high school hackers. The college students also gave tech-talks on how to use data and create games and apps.
For more information, visit Anthony’s hackathon project page at http://lhd.hackAHS.com.
---
Image via Shutterstock
Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.
