Lady Hacks II: 8 projects at second annual, female-focused hackathon

In celebration of International Women’s Day last weekend, 80 local developers and students gathered at First Round Capital to collaborate on projects for the city’s second annual LadyHacks, a hackathon geared at getting more women involved in the tech community.

The event, which was organized by a volunteer committee of members from Girl Develop It (including, full disclosure, this writer) and Girl Geek Dinners and led by Sondra Willhite, who spearheaded the first LadyHacks in 2013, saw a 20 percent increase in attendance. That number was made up of 33 percent students from regional CS programs, about 10 percent women looking to transition to tech careers and 16 developers who also served as mentors.

Of those who were repeat attendees, many had a chance to participate more deeply in the development side of the work after a year of growing their skills. Nearly half of the team members who launched She Tech Philly at last year’s LadyHacks are now working full-time as developers.

Here are the projects that were created or built on at LadyHacks:

• Rent Safe: a map that uses Craigslist rental listings and city crime data to help renters find the safest rentals.
• STEM Girl Connect: a mobile app that helps women and girls find mentors in the fields of STEM.
• She Tech Philly: this local resource site for all things “women in tech” in Philadelphia got a redesign and added some new content.
• 311 Glass Reporting: An app using Google Glass that can be used to report typical 311 nuisances: broken street lights, potholes and more.
• WeAreTechWomen: Inspired by the WeWorkInPhilly project, this map seeks to show profiles of women who work in tech in the area and hopes to expand internationally.
• “Educational game” (a tentative name): A game that allows the user to practice learning code.
• Penn State Beginner’s Luck: a game built by two Penn State students using Construct 2, that forces the player to travel through the game while dodging objects and answering trivia.

The 1.5 day event also raised $1,074 for TechGirlz, the local nonprofit organization that offers workshops and camps to introduce middle-school aged girls to technology career paths.

See a Storify on LadyHacks from local Android developer and LadyHacks mentor, Corey Latislaw, here. Read a recap on Pam Selle‘s blog.

LadyHacks also partnered with Google Developer Group and Women TechMakers on this event.