This past weekend I organized my final HackED, I can’t even explain how weird it is to be done.

I remember naming it HackED with my friend Brittany back in 2015, I participated in that one (where I made ShoutBox). HackED 2015 had 60-some students.

This weekend there was over 170 students at the opening ceremonies, tripling the participants in 3 years. We featured workshops, HackED branded t-shirts and stickers, trivia prizes, and more. We have a dedicated team that continues to refine the structure of the event while also supporting more participants than ever.

I remember every single event of how we came to this point. And to be honest, none of them are grand. I think that’s what growth really is, natural change over time. It’s only when you look back do you see it.

And damn, I see it.

I can also see the impact we made with these events. We shook up the strict academic culture of the school and made space for innovators and creative thinkers. We slowly brought so many students outside their comfort zones. Over the three years students would first hear of the hackathon, then have their friends attend, then finally attend the event themselves.

One story I always love is how my friend Liza, an EE, went from being mad at us one year, for delaying her birthday dinner because of our coding party, to coding on her birthday two years later - because she wanted to clean up her first ever hackathon project (she even placed!)

I think about all the students that would come up to me after the event thanking me for the great time. I always wondered why they felt so compelled, but looking back I think it's clear that it's because we made sideprojects fun. Coding to them was a boring thing they did in classes and labs, hackathons opened their eyes to show that they can build anything.

That's why I love hackathons so much, they're so liberating. I can’t wait to see how HackED will grow in the future. I hope it keeps getting bigger and continues to flurish the community and the students.