Meet the Team: Jason — Co-Director of Volunteers

Me taking a break from volunteering at the first HackBCA

I attended my first hackathon when I was a junior in high school after one of my friends, who started attending them his sophomore year, convinced me to finally go. Funnily enough that my first hackathon was HackRU spring 2013 and I fell in love with the scene immediately. The fact that mentors at these events stuck around for almost the entire time with their only intention being to help these students make their hacks was fascinating. I remember being stuck at one point in our project for hours and asking for help from a hilarious mentor who only seemed to talk with sentences that ended in profanities. “Get rid of that bull sh*t … add some of that crap…” and no matter how long we kept this mentor busy with what I’m sure were really basic questions, not once did he show a sign that we were wasting his time. This, in addition to my love of programming, made me love everything about hackathons. In fact I loved my first, second, third and fourth HackRUs so much, that it was the main reason I decided to come to Rutgers.

My first app at a hackathon :’) Of course it was a terrible image sharer, but it was a teribble image sharer that we built

Hackathons have become an important part of my life and I have learned so much from attending them. To start, I’ve learned a lot about programming and will continue to learn a lot about programming from going to these events. Whether your team decides to make a web app in python or a GUI using C# that generates raps for you, you are going to encounter things you haven’t touched before and this is the best way to learn how to actually program. Some of the most important things that I’ve become better at is working inside of a group, making sure our group is having fun, and getting stuff done. Hackathons have made me much more comfortable speaking in front of people and presenting our ideas, since you’re forced to do it so much.

My Team at hackBU Spring 2016, which we somehow managed to win!

During my first semester as a freshman at Rutgers, I volunteered at HackRU and loved helping out with my school’s hackathon. I am more than excited this semester to be the co-director of volunteers at HackRU Spring 2016. I hope to make HackRU run very smoothly with the help of the amazing people who will volunteer at this semester’s event! I really know that this semester’s HackRU will be a blast and I can’t wait to see what amazing hacks everyone comes up with!

Cheers,
Jason Tuhy