This 15-year-old launched a high school hacker meetup

Fifteen-year-old Victor Lourng organized the first High School Hackers meetup in 12 days.

Student entrepreneurship group nvigor helped him find a venue (MacAlister Hall at Drexel University) and Point.io developer evangelist Angel Rivera helped him secure sponsorship from companies like linode and AutoDesk DC for food.

Held on May 10, the first meetup was packed with a show and tell for projects, guest speakers and of course, hacking time. Nineteen people showed up for the first time, said Lourng. The monthly group will meet every second Saturday. Next month, it’ll be at hackerspace Devnuts.

Lourng, who goes to Lower Moreland High School in Montgomery County, said he launched the meetup to reconnect with high school hackers he met at hackathons like PennApps and PilotPhilly. It’s also a way to expose high schoolers to the Philly tech scene, something that organizations and events like nvigor and Start.Stay.Grow try to do with college students.

It seems like more and more high schoolers are getting involved with the local tech scene: 40 high schoolers participated in the most recent PennApps, the highest number to date.