What’s a Hackathon?
Hackathon is an approach to group problem-solving, used to crowdsource solutions, and to address pressing real-life problems or social issues. A hackathon is
- concentrated work (like a sprint) among a group of people on one problem statement
- a time-bound event, they can be 24 hours to a week long!
- can be competitive, but doesn’t have to be
- involves collaboration of participants who don’t necessarily know each other
- used to build mock-ups or proofs of concept and minimum viable products (MVP) for a specific pre-defined problem.
This tool originated in the design space to build innovative ideas quickly. Now, hackathons have found their place in the non-profit world because it reduces the barriers to innovating on solutions to pressing social issues such as housing, poverty, climate justice, in a concerted, rapid and collaborative way.
hackathon: where groups engage in rapid, collaborative solutions-engineering that is time-bound, and empathy-based. It involves the practice of rigorously challenging ideas, approaches and problem definitions to better uncover solutions, address policies, systems and assumptions.
~Salomeh Ahmadi, Humber College
Who Can Participate?
We encourage people from all walks of life and with all experience levels to join a hackathon event. This encourages a good mix of participants! Everyone has knowledge, questions, and ideas to contribute. The collaboration of different minds is the key. You don’t need previous experience. Typically, an event gathers a group of diverse and cross-disciplinary people interested in a topic (for e.g. innovation, housing, social enterprises, civic tech, etc.) to ideate in quick, collaborative ways on a problem statement and produce a model or solution that you want to actually create. It’s typically timed, such as for a weekend or a week long sprint format where everyone is dedicated to the problem and solution, rather than stretch it out over months and even years!
Steps to a Non-profit Focused Hackathon
- Theme – choose a theme for your hackathon event
- Place – organize and host your event
- Problem Statement – develop a clear problem statement to solve (see further below)
- Pitch – on event day, pitch the problem statements to attendees
- Join one – the participants choose which one to join
- Time-bound – groups remain for the duration of the ‘hack’, typically consecutive
- Discuss – ask good questions, empathize, perspective-take, discuss assumptions and holes in the “solution”
- Pitch – present back to the group or a panel for feedback
- Catalyze – implement the prototype beyond the hackathon to small group of users or in a test run
- Mentorship or guidance (optional) – include consistent resources (and creativity) to support the idea so that it’s not lost or forgotten.
What’s prototyping
A prototype is a mock-up of the solution that you want to create. Prototyping is an experimental process where teams design ideas into tangible forms, which can include a model, physical rendering, blueprint, process, or roadmap. This is dependent on the problem statement. Prototyping will help the group decide whether or not the design (solution, changes, model, etc.) might work the way you intended them to—before they’re out in the world and implemented in real time. Typically, the prototype is done as a quick model, aiming for completion and not perfection, but iterating back if something does not work or has a barrier or a missed assumption or blind spot that was not previously considered. That is where the pitches, question and answer period, and post-event mentoring can come in hand. Ideally the prototype considers a creative, innovative, realistic or reasonable solution. This can be a long-haul idea or one that requires little to no resources – don’t kill good ideas!
Saving Resources
Prototyping is a very valuable step in the design thinking process. This tool or approach is intended to place those most impacted (or the end-user) at the heart of the idea or solution you’re proposing. It’s not meant to just solve something for someone, rather with others. This is particularly important in non-profit work, where collaboration, partnership, resource sharing and coalition building are beneficial. This approach requires the group to test the idea or design in its preliminary states (perhaps research or work plan). Prototypes make this possible without spending loads of time and money, especially when it’s limited.
Inclusive and Cross-Disciplinary
Hackathons are inclusive, agile, promote multi-disciplinary collaboration, and have shorter innovation cycles that are better suited to resource scarce groups, changing policy, limited time to innovative individually within affinity, or siloed, groups.
Example #1
Address the impact of COVID-19 on housing inequality and instability and the issue of race and ethnicity in relation to housing affordability. Solution: using existing parking lots to rapidly address existing housing needs.
Example #2
Sustainable Renting and Affordable Homeownership – DUSP (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) took advantage of AB 2011 that recently passed in California to think about commercial conversions and how these spaces can be put to better use. The students proposed an app that would help cities and developers identify dead space that can be converted into affordable housing. Although the legislation has only passed in California, the concept itself is viable across the entire country. (National Student Competition for Housing, USA)
Example #3
Environmental Solutions and Construction Technology – Team Beckwith (Harvard Graduate School of Design) proposed a district-level geothermal ownership structure for a particular community in South Boston. The issue of energy retrofits for existing building stock is receiving a lot of attention from federal and local officials around the country, making it a timely approach. (National Student Competition for Housing, USA)
Example #4
How do we prevent bullying amongst grade 9 high school students in Toronto? The group can come together to think through this by discussing what the problem is carefully and empathetically – who does this impact, are there gender, cultural or geographical differences, where does it happen, how does it happens, etc. and then decide as a group what would be a reasonable process to address this – could it be an event? An app? A policy change? A new course on empathy in schools? And then, given the time permitted, outlining the prototype for the group’s proposed solution – how will they design and implement it a mock-up of that solution.
Some more example pitches related to housing, include:
https://greenhouse.devpost.com/project-gallery
https://ivoryinnovations.org/2022-hackahouse-teams
CMHC Successful Innovation Projects
Developing a Problem Statement
When developing a problem statement, consider:
- Are we solving the right problem?
- Is the problem worth solving?
- What challenges or limitations might we face in addressing this problem, and how can we address them?
Ideally, the problem statement should be specific yet broad enough so that there is not a knowledge barrier to entry. Participants with a variety of knowledge and skills around the theme (such as housing) should be able to have a positive experience engaging with the problem and have something to contribute.
Let’s create spaces where our ideas, knowledge, and contributions can connect into tangible outcomes.
General Guidelines
Rules or guidelines differ depending on the event. Typically, the event has time restrictions – there is a week or 48 hours to complete the idea. Teams can use any knowledge necessary, have laptops on hand, research or digital libraries, frameworks, or open-source code in their projects.
Pitches
Typically, hackathons are presented as a competition. In the spirit of community and collaboration, we propose a non-profit approach to hackathons that does not promote one final winner that receives a cheque, but perhaps groups receive further mentorship, free space, in-kind support, or all of them receive a small pool of funding to soundboard their idea. Each group presents their pitches to the larger group, and a panel of “experts” questions their solution. For e.g. if this is about social entrepreneurial solutions to a social issue it might be helpful to have a business mind to ask specific questions, if it is proposing building something having a lawyer or financial expert present to ask questions. Alternatively, in a community-focused hackathon, experts are the community, and they can pose helpful questions, or critique, that promotes equitable solutions, by addressing any gaps, or unintended impacts in the proposed pitches.
Join us for, Building a Path Forward, Housing Affordability Conference, below
Resources
Hackathon Toolkit with a Focus on Policy Change https://gordonfoundation.ca/northern-policy-hackathon-toolkit/
Hackathon Guide https://hackathon.guide/
Selecting Speakers http://conference.hopper.org.nz/#speakers
