Project: Together Vs Virus: Online Hackathon Against COVID-19
Locations: Abbotsford, Canada + online
Date: April-May, 2020
Format: Virtual Hackathon

The Challenge

In the midst of the current global pandemic, many individuals were and still are isolated because of health restrictions. It seems that there was a general sense of dissatisfaction, especially from those that felt like they couldn’t do anything constructive within their communities. As the economy rapidly shifted online, it was necessary to consider feelings of loneliness from being isolated, while working to strengthen digital skills and provide relevant resources for individuals to prototype solutions to deal with the effects of this crisis.

The Solution

We designed a nationwide and bilingual hackathon. An online hackathon was the most suitable solution to reduce isolation, unleash creativity, and empower people to be proactive in the midst of a crisis. We created a virtual space where developers and designers could meet and even collaborate with the general public.

Press

Burnaby student's app is countering COVID-19 domestic violence. Burnaby Now
Six winning teams came up with concepts to help people during hard times. The Runner
Hack the virus. Montreal Gazette

With many individuals that are isolated at home due to the pandemic, feelings of isolation and dissatisfaction slowly start to crawl into our lives.

As many of us are not frontline workers, it's often hard to find different ways that we can contribute and help out in the community during a crisis. The pandemic affects us all, regardless of our background, education or expertise. As the world gradually transitions towards a virtual landscape, this crisis was a calling for innovation, creativity, and collaboration. Nobody knew the crisis was going to last this long, so we decided to act in spite of it. Within three weeks, the project was up and running.

The 48-hour Together Vs Virus Hackathon was a bilingual online event that compiled the collective intelligence of researchers, technology specialists, and fellow citizens to develop potential solutions for dealing with and combating the effects of the coronavirus.

We felt like an online hackathon was a perfect union to reduce isolation, unleash limitless creativity, and empower people to be proactive amidst difficult periods. Not only was it a space where developers and designers could meet and collaborate, but it was also open to the general public as well. We didn't want to limit the event only to people with advanced technical skills because we believed that anyone can develop technical skills if they have the right mentors and spaces to foster those skills. 

We were convinced that if we put as many brilliant and creative minds from the community into a singular digital space, we could help participants discover their own potentials and find innovative solutions. We were determined to provide individuals with resources and a network of teachers, change the pessimistic narrative regarding the pandemic, and transform passivity into proactivity. 

Trying to find a way to facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration amongst the participants and mentors, was a matter of trying to appeal to the masses, while trying to provide an incentive for potential participants to get involved and not feel intimidated due to their lack of technical skills. We worked hard to craft inclusive advertisements, namely focusing on making our language inclusive to attract participants from various disciplines to partake in our event. Additionally, we created many videos and guides to help new participants get rooted in the hackathon project-making process. 

To address those individuals that lacked the motivation and the physical space to turn their ideas into prospective solutions, our team decided to raise funds so that we could provide prizes to the winning project groups. Additionally, we reached out to industry professionals, mentors, and advisors from accelerator programs to provide guidance to participants during the event. Lastly, we decided to go with a 48 hour time span for the event to help participants feel a sense of urgency to find a potential solution. By providing prize incentives, communal support and advice, and a time frame, we hoped to make the project-making process as engaging to the participants as it could be.

However, we were aware that online event experiences differ greatly from in-person events. To replicate the in-person event experience as much as possible, we established team bonding sessions to reduce the feelings of loneliness that were becoming increasingly prevalent during these times. Moreover, we gave participants the option to choose their teammates based on skills, personalities, and interests. This process was essential to ensure that the participants felt welcome in their teams, namely while working with those that have more advanced technical skills.

Participants and their respective teams started off by submitting challenges that were relevant to COVID-19, and then proceeded to find professionals and mentors for feedback on their proposed ideas. In order to make the communication as personable and accessible as possible, we opted for communication technologies like Google Forms, Slack, and Zoom; we found that maintaining face-to-face contact made the experience parallel the in-person experience the most. 

For those teams that had difficulties deciding which area of the grand problem to focus on, we offered different topic areas like education, crime reduction, and solidarity. We did this to help reduce their feelings of stress associated with trying to solve too many problems at once and help participants focus their energy into one lane instead of five. Additionally, by partnering with companies like Telus, Google, and the University of Fraser Valley, we provided participants with mentors and experienced industry professionals so that they could ask for the required support they in order to pursue their project ideas.

Partners

• Bringing a national team of co-initiators to help kick-start exciting projects: from TEDxAbbotsford, XLRator, Impact Hub Montreal, Montreal NewTech, made of 14 team-members

• Partnering with key higher education institutions to share resources and connect participants with mentors: University of Fraser the Valley, British Columbia Institute of Technology 

• Finding financial partners that are involved in the community and share similar values than the project: Envision Financial

• Partnering with different innovation ecosystems across Canada to spark curiosity and creativity: Impact Hub Ottawa, Cefrio, SFU Capital savings venture connection, Google, TEDxOttawa, ISM arts & culture, BLab Canada, Swiss-Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Pints n’ Pitches, Impact Calgary, Global Shapers community Montreal, Montréal Invivo, VanHack, Telus

• Finding key governmental agencies to amplify the project: Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germany Montreal, Consulate General of Switzerland in Vancouver

From ideation to final execution, the hackathon project was complex to organize and facilitate across the 48 hours. However, we had compiled over $20,000 in project prizes, kept constant communication within slack groups of over 500 participants, mentors, and partners, and lastly worked diligently to create a distinguishable brand for the event through social media.

More than 500 participants, 100 mentors, and 25 partner organizations across Canada, quickly responded to this call for this 48-hour collaboration from April 17-19, to co-develop useful and creative technology solutions to challenges associated with the coronavirus. Over 20k in project prizes were provided to winning projects by BCIT for analytics, Impact Hub for the best demonstration of the SDGs, and SFU Capital Savings for projects from the SFU community. The winning projects ranged from carpool matchmaking services to burnout prevention systems; truly innovation at its finest. Most importantly, the results attained, continue to have rippling effects amongst the community even months after the event has ended.

Every project, regardless of whether the teams were awarded prizes, were provided opportunities to reach out to members and accelerator programs or incubators in the community in order potentially further their hackathon project into something larger. We ensured that open-source sample codes, datasets, and literature were available for everyone to utilize even after the event.

All in all, we were blown away by the dedication and skills that the participants brought to tackle these difficult and important problems. We hope to use the insights garnered from planning Together vs Virus to host an even better hackathon or event the next time around.

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