HackCamp 2019 Winning Projects
A look back at notable projects from Build Day 2019
For 2020, we’re back with the 5th iteration of North America’s largest beginner-friendly hackathon, UBC Local Hack Day. Only with our local community relocating to their homes around the world, we decided to leave behind “Local” Hack Day and bring you all to the greater outdoors and online with our newly rebranded HackCamp 2020 — featuring the same Learn Day and Build Day you know and love! ⛺🐻
To get in the spirit of learning, building, and sharing, let’s take a look back at Build Day 2019 and some of the notable projects that came along with it!
On November 30th, 2019, over 400 diverse student hackers across the Lower Mainland came together to make UBC Local Hack Day 2019: Build Day the largest Local Hack Day event in North America, dedicated to promoting inclusivity, diversity, and accessibility in the tech community. Be sure to check out all 55+ project submissions here.
1st Place Winner: Helping Hand 🤝
Team: Edmund Oh, Emma Oh, Dooyong Pan, Gary Hwu, Kevin Choi
Check out their project here!
Homelessness is a social crisis that has been rapidly accelerating over the past decade, and surviving extreme winters have become increasingly difficult for those living without shelter. Helping Hand is a web solution that enables a safe and secure way to seamlessly make digital micro-donations to the homeless with limited risks.
Powered by Node/Express, PostgreSQL, and React, “Givers” are able to make virtual donations to “Receivers” with a simple scan of their custom QR code. Funds are automatically deposited into their virtual wallet, and Receivers without smart phones are able to redeem and use their donations by visiting a participating merchant — whether it be for food, clothing, or other basic needs. This ensures funds are securely transferred, easily accessible, and used for living essentials instead of narcotics, alcohol, or contraband.
2nd Place Winner: super-warm 🥰
Team: Andrew Tran, Janie Wang, Tommy Tho
Check out their project here!
Transitioning and navigating through university can be a challenging time for many, and reaching out for help can feel equally as intimidating. super-warm is an digital mental health forum designed to foster a safe, accessible, and anonymous community for university students to seek support.
Implemented using Java, CSS, HTML, and Javascript, super-warm provides a supportive and open platform for university students to connect with each other, as well as mental health professionals. Users are able to make anonymous Reddit-style posts, participate in online live chatrooms, and schedule appointments with verified experts and consultants.
3rd Place Winner: Banking on Food 📍
Team: Alice Kim, Jasmine Lew, Shirley Bi, Roy Hwang
Check out their project here!
Food banks continue to be a staple source of meals for an incredibly wide spectrum of individuals in society. Banking on Food is an application dedicated to tackling the issue of availability and accessibility of healthy foods at food banks through gamification.
Developed using Javascript, React Native, and Figma, Banking on Food gamifies the food donation process to incentivise and encourage consistent donations to food banks. The application also provides food bank users the ability to view availability of foods at different locations, and offers food banks the opportunity to specify their supply needs and develop more personal connections with the community.
Learn Merit Prize: MentrMatchr ☕
Team: Andrew Yang, Jackson Yuan, Myla White, Napat Karnsakultorn
Check out their project here!
An advantageous aspect of stepping into the evergrowing tech industry as a student is meeting mentors that can offer insightful advice and help guide the way — but seeking out the ideal mentor isn’t always easy. MentrMatchr is a web application that provides a safe online community for students to better personalize their own mentorship experience.
Built using React, Node, and Express, MentrMatchr allows students to selectively choose their own mentors based on personal preferences, such as educational background or industry experience. This platform allows users to build their professional networks with the valuable mentors that best suits their interest and help them feel most comfortable with.
Build Merit Prize: International Exchange 🌎
Team: Benny Lin, Darren Wen, Patrick Thangarajah, Stella Wang
Check out their project here!
Our world is a beautifully diverse society embedded with an array of cultural differences, but with that comes the challenge of social barriers from language differences. International Exchange aims to connect users from various language backgrounds by allowing them to communicate in their own respective languages.
With the power of APIs and Python, International Exchange translates speech and text conversations between users in real time to break the barrier of communication between diverse cultures. By doing so, the application promotes a more culturally understanding, inclusive, and diverse society around the world.
Share Merit Prize: MentorMe 👩💻
Check out their project here!
We believe that hackathons are all about coming together to learn, build, and share innovative projects together, regardless of background or experiences — which is why we absolutely love MentorMe! This web application is a virtual co-working space designed for programmers and designers to find projects and hackathon opportunities around the world to collaborate on.
Created using Javascript, HTML, CSS, Python Flask, and Figma, MentorMe allows tech creators of all backgrounds to find projects to contribute to, find teams to work with, showcase technical skills, and get recognized by recruiters. The co-working space also connects industry professionals with mentees to share feedback, insights, and support to foster an open environment of tech learning.
Closing Thoughts
Year after year, we are consistently surprised by the number of innovative projects that come to life in just the span of 12 hours. While we were only able to showcase 6 projects in this article, every single concept learned, project built, and idea shared is worth celebrating. We invite you to check out the rest of the projects here!
As a beginner friendly hackathon, Build Day is not only a celebration of projects created, but also a celebration of learning, building, and sharing technologies together. This year, in addition to the Top 3 prizes, we also introduced our new Learn, Build, and Share Merit prizes. These Merit prizes were awarded to teams who best demonstrated the three core values of UBC Local Hack Day in a written reflection about their projects.
UBC Local Hack Day 2019 was the first of many hackathons for a lot of tech newbies, and aside from building cool projects, hackathons are a place for tech lovers to learn new skills, meet industry mentors, and form meaningful connections. Whether you know nothing about technology or are a hackathon veteran, we really hope to see you hacking away during Build Day at our newly rebranded HackCamp.
Until next time! 👋
Words by Rebecca Xie, Marketing Director 2020/2021
Stay in touch: Facebook | Instagram | Twitter
