On March 28, Viking Hacks and IHS CompSci collaborated to execute Viking Hacks 3.0, a hackathon featuring high attendance from schools across the Bay Area and $2,000 in cash prizes for winners. While the event spanned only a single day, the preparation behind it required weeks of coordination from club officers.
Poorv Patil (12), president of Viking Hacks and one of the main organizers, alongside Eric Shen (11), Eric Shen (11), Nidhi Riju (12), Angela Ye (12), Max Zhang (11), and Medha Srungarapu (12), stated one main goal behind this year’s event was to gain a larger scale. “One thing we explored this year was expanding beyond Irvington to see if we could make it a Fremont hackathon and we ended up having a much larger than expected reach this year. We had people coming from Tracy and further, so that was really cool. It became a Bay Area event.”
The behind-the-scenes efforts involved a large amount of coordination between the two clubs and ASG, pertaining to the venue, tech, catering, and scoring systems. Specifically, officers were responsible for ensuring that Irvington’s tech was capable of supporting all aspects of the hackathon, purchasing and picking up enough Panda Express for attendees, and designing a judging system with multiple specialized tracks to ensure diverse competition.
Angela Ye (12), one of the main minds behind publicity and judging, explained the efforts required to secure the extremely eye-catching $2,000 prize pool. “We had to email a lot of companies for sponsors, over 50 emails with even less than 10 responses. It was around $200, $500, or $1000 from each company. It took a lot of outreach, but because it wasn’t a first time event, we had some previous connections.” Additionally, Ye’s role also extended into publicity, where she publicized the event primarily through social media reels and physical outreach at local hackathons.
While competition and innovation were the main attractions, organizers cite human moments as the most memorable. For Patil, the highlight was seemingly “mundane” moments, such as running errands at Staples or purchasing supplies with fellow organizers.
The success of Viking Hacks 3.0 was not evident only through the large attendance and attention-grabbing cash prize, but rather through the passionate participation coming from attendees. “[The best part] was seeing how passionate everyone was, especially during the presentations, even though they didn’t have as much time. You could tell that they put in their best effort, even if the chances of winning were around 1 in 100.” Ye reflected, “I love seeing everyone having cool projects and I think they cared more about their project than the award, which is really nice.”
Overall, the booming success of Viking Hacks 3.0 sets a high bar for next year’s team, as Viking Hacks 4.0 has big shoes to fill. Encouraging underclassmen to engage with Viking Hacks on a deeper level, Patil emphasized, “If you’re interested in technology at all, whether you have no background, or you’re proficient in programming, I highly encourage you to get involved with Viking Hacks next year.”
