Thousands of local college students with tech industry skills and ambitions have had their internship and job offers rescinded over the past 2 months, jeopardizing their opportunities to, 1) learn & demonstrate their skills, 2) explore cities and job opportunities, 3) grow their personal and professional networks, and 4) earn money to cover living expenses. For many, this summer was a critical window of opportunity for them to get experience, prove themselves, and secure employment.
TechPoint created the Summer Opportunities for Students Challenge to activate our community to fill this gap. Students will be organized into teams of 5-7 to work on one of nine community based challenges caused by COVID-19. Teams will have 5 weeks to validate the business case for their solution, build a functional prototype, and record a presentation with product demo. Students who complete the challenge will be eligible to receive a $500 housing stipend!
Eligibility
Participants must be 18 years or older, reside in the Eastern or Central time zones at the time of participation (to maximize work time overlap), and be eligible to work in the United States. Students providing submissions were reviewed and admitted to the program by TechPoint staff.
Requirements
PROJECT SUBMISSION
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- All teams should have a team name and be registered with Devpost
- Our Challenge on DevPost will open during week 5 and directions will be reviewed in our Weekly Sprint Meeting on July 20th
- The Devpost team page listing is required to have the following elements in order to be judged:
- A video recording of your team presenting your challenge solution and showing a product demo (10 minutes maximum). DevPost will allow embedded videos from YouTube, Facebook Video, or Vimeo.
- Your completed slide deck that is used in the presentation video and uploaded as a PDF file too.
- A short abstract about the team and solution (Note: DevPost uses MarkDown Syntax in their portfolio submissions. You can learn more about markdown syntax here)
- Completed Environmental Analysis, Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition Canvas, and Customer Persona(s) uploaded as PDFs
- A few notes:
- Challenge Topic - Team # - Submission Item
- Example: Telehealth - Team 1 - Video Presentation, Telehealth - Team 1 - Slide Deck
- Consistently use the following naming convention for each element:
- The video and accompanying slides that you use in the video are intended to be your team’s chance to dazzle! Show off your product as if you were pitching it to prospective investors or customers.
- The abstract is your opportunity to provide a look behind the scenes into the journey and rationale that your team used to reach the end point.
- The completed additional documents are intended to show your work and thinking that led to your outcomes.
- Templates are provided for the slide deck and abstracts. You are welcome to change style elements (i.e. fonts, colors, backgrounds, etc.) in addition to make content changes. Please note though that judges will be looking for the named elements in your abstract and presentations so as you make changes, be sure to not veer too far from the core components.
- You are welcome to use the templates referenced by instructors from the Monday weekly sprint meetings for the Environmental Analysis, Business Model Canvas, Value Proposition Canvas, and Customer Persona(s) or other templates you’ve found or adapted during the challenge.
- A sample DevPost page created by our team that previews what your project could look like.
- Check out this completed abstract example as a guideline.
- To review the judging criteria, please click here.
- All projects submissions will be randomly code-reviewed if applicable.
Prizes
$25,000 in prizes
Fan Favorite
The team with the most votes in the gallery at the conclusion of judging will receive a $2500 prize!
Best Solution - COVID-19 Outbreak Detection
Identify a solution to regularly test/monitor Indiana’s citizens, quickly identify hotspots, and enable contact tracing and other measures to mitigate and limit further outbreaks.
Best Solution - Telehealth
Identify a solution for the remote monitoring of a specific patient-health condition or therapy regimen that reduces or even eliminates the number of visits to the care giver’s facilities.
Best Solution - Sports & Entertainment
Identify solutions for teams and venues to engage fans and our broader community in meaningful ways during closures and drive tune-in as we host events without spectators present. This could include solutions to enhance fan engagement and/or revenue potential in or outside the venue.
Best Solution - Work From Home
Identify a solution to help employers -- by measuring productivity, mental health, and/or engagement -- determine what positive or negative impact working from home is having on productivity or employee sustainability. The data could also be used to determine which employees are well suited to work from home and which are not. Alternatively, identify a solution to enable California Closets to capture the market opportunity presented by working-from-home professionals seeking custom/semi-custom home office solutions.
Best Solution - Transportation
Identify a solution for IndyGo or the Indianapolis airport to improve the traveler experience or business performance. Alternatively, identify a solution for the city or citizens to increase their access to multi-modal transportation.
Best Solution - Restaurants & Small Business
Identify a solution that could help small businesses survive and adapt during COVID. Alternatively, identify a solution that might now be presented during or after COVID to enhance service or revenue opportunities.
Best Solution - Tourism
Identify a solution to position Indy as a city who has taken the COVID-19 crisis seriously, creating a safe place to host events and meetings.. Alternatively, identify a solution that will help hotels improve guest experience and safety.
Best Solution - Schools & Colleges
Identify a solution to help teachers or school administration make distance learning or a hybrid distance learning/classroom scenario more successful, with an emphasis on competency-based learning and moving away from time-based systems like semesters and school years.
Best Solution - Community-based Nonprofits
Identify a solution to help them more efficiently, effectively, or safely deliver services or address the underlying problems they are tackling.
Devpost Achievements
Submitting to this hackathon could earn you:
Judges
Merillat Flowers
TechPoint
Peter Embi
President & CEO, Regenstrief Institute
Todd Saxton
VP Business Development, Regenstrief Institute
Brad Bostic
CEO, HC1.com
Keegan Jiles
Talent Acquisition Manager, HC1.com
Dr. Patrick McGill
Chief Analytics Officer, Community Health Network
Dr. John Kunzer
President, Community Physician Network
Allison Barber
President & COO, Indiana Fever
Matt Mindrum
VP of Marketing & Communication, Indianapolis Motor Speedway
Dr. David Pierce
Associate Professor & Director of the Sports Innovation Institute, IUPUI
Marcus Hall
President & Partner, California Closets
Jessical Earley
Sales Manager, California Closets
Jerome Horne
Ridership Experience Specialist, IndyGO
Joshua Tharp
Bikeshare Operations Director, Indianapolis Cultural Trail & Pacers Bikeshare
Kim Irwin
Executive Director, Health By Design
Reid Goldsmith
Senior Director of IT, Indianapolis Airport Authority
Stevi Stoesz
Executive Director, Indianapolis City Market
Neal Brown
Chef & Owner of Ukiyo, The Libertine, & Pizzology
Brian Schutt
Owner, Homesense Heating & Cooling & Co-Founder of Refinery46
Elise Shrock
Director of Operations, Tamm Capital Group
Chris Gahl
SVP Marketing & Communications
Matthew Belsaas
President & Founder Trajectory
Unai Miguel Andes
GIS & Data Analyst, The Pollis Center at IUPUI
Al Carroll
University Activation Senior Manager, TechPoint
Kyle Peeler
Front-end Software Engineer, PactSafe
Mike Hockerman
Senior Software Engineer, Structural
Dr. Paul Talaga
Assistant Professor, University of Indianapolis
Dr. Jon Sorenson
Professor, Butler University
Kenneth Jarnigan
IT Software Engineer, Cummins
Judging Criteria
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Customer Fit
Did they sufficiently identify a customer persona and do customer research? How well does the proposed solution meet and demonstrate an understanding of customer jobs needed to be done, pains, and gains? -
Creativity
How creative or novel is the solution or the approach to the market? -
Market Potential
Is there a larger market potential for the solution that indicates startup potential or other business viability? -
Design
Understanding that the product is a prototype developed in a short time, how effective & elegant is the product design? Consider both UX and also code or other product construction. Bonus for "killer feature" that differentiates or would get attention. -
Engineering
Understanding that the product is a prototype developed in a short time, is the product well architected with stability, flexibility, and security in mind? Note: any product plagiarism will disqualify the team from competition. -
Tool/Technology Selection & Implementation
Did the team select the right tool(s) for the job and implement them effectively? Will the choices and implementation put them on path for quick, effective iterations now and scalability in the future? -
Customer Segment and Value Proposition
How effectively have they defined and understood the market (customers & competitors) and how compelling is their demonstrated value proposition? Do they have a credible, likely effective plan for marketing and distribution? -
Dependencies
Do they understand the key resources, key activities, and key partnerships that will be required for success? -
Financial Model
How well have they illustrated understanding of revenue model, revenue drivers, and cost drivers? How impressive and credible is the demonstrated revenue model?
Questions? Email the hackathon manager
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