Mason group ranking high at "Hackathons" across DC area

A student group from Mason placed first at the World Bank WaterHackathon in D.C. on Sunday, October 23, continuing a string of successful showings at various regional Hackathon events.

“Hackathons are 24 hour coding marathons where you come up with a project according to a specific theme,” said Muneeb Akhter, former president of Mason ECHO, the group that competed. “You generally attend, are asked to form teams, come up with an idea, and design a workable solution in accordance with your idea."

The ideas are formally demoed to the judges, and prizes are awarded to the top teams

The winning team consisted of Akhter and Josh Snider.

Mason ECHO, or Electrical & Computer Hacking Organization, is a “student organization trying to prepare students with the tools and skills they need after they graduate,” said Akhter in an email.

Their purpose is “making students more desirable to companies, and broadening their knowledge in the fields of Computer Science, IT, and Engineering.”

The goal of WaterHackathon is "challenging water and technology experts to work together and create innovative solutions to today's global water problems," according to the event website.

ECHO's winning entry was SMS Water Billing, designed to allow users to pay their water bills via text message instead of travelling to a billing center or worrying about overcrowded phone lines.

"They created a product that can be used immediately by one of our clients in Gabarone, Botswana and that we can apply with several other countries around the world," said Jose Luis Irigoyen, World Bank Director of Transport, Water and ICT, in an email.

ECHO's other recent successes include Helping Hand, a smartphone app that allows users to discretely call for help in any kind of situation.  The app sends out notifications to other users within a 5 mile radius, indicating the location of the distressed person. 

Helping Hand took third place at the AT&T Hackathon on Oct 15.

At Code4Country on Sept 27, ECHO achieved second place with the Neighborhood Network Notifier, a text message based social network that allows neighbors to easily keep in touch with each other within a 1 mile radius.

"In a world of dwindling family/communal values, this helps the neighborhood stay together," Akhter said regarding this system.

"I hope in the future to diverge for an SMS based solution alone to achieve other feats," said Akhter, "but there's never been a Hackathon we've attended, where we haven't placed."

Hackathons are held in the D.C. metro area nearly every week.  Upcoming events include DCWEEK Hackathon, Education Hack Day, and MoDevEast.