Some Positive News After Last Weeks Silicon Valley Sexism

by Kin Lane on 03/26/2012

With all the attention sexism in silicon valley has gotten, I wanted to make sure and showcase some positive news on the Hackathon front this week.

There was a great article in the Oregonian out of Portland called, "Intel 'Code for Good' hackathon helps nonprofits solve technology challenges".

The theme for the hackathon: Girls in education

Code for Good co-organizer Josh Bancroft worked with co-organizer Renee Kuriyan and employees in Intel's corporate affairs group to help four nonprofit organizations, World Pulse, a Portland-based nonprofit; Room to Read; 10X10: Educate Girls Change the World; and Global Campaign for Education.

"I felt like we could amplify the impact" by software and corporate working together, Bancroft said. The partnerships were already established by corporate affairs, and the software group simply brought the technical expertise.

Their task was to create software solutions to real-world problems facing girls in education, and for each team to develop an app by the end of the day that the nonprofits could then put to use. The hackathon theme is part of Intel's "She Will" campaign and with the company's overarching mission to "create and extend computing technology to connect and enrich the lives of every person on Earth."

You can read more about the great hackathon over at Oregon Live. I just wanted to point out that not all hackathons are male dominated, and the model can go much further than some of what we see coming out of Silicon Valley.