Two Shady Side Academy students, bonded by a common love of zeros and ones, are preparing to expand their multi-school district technology-based competition.
Zeros and ones are the two digits used in binary code, often described as the fundamental language of computers.
Juniors Thomas Wang of Fox Chapel and Vivan Poddar of Sewickley both came to the academy in eighth grade with an interest in technology. They quickly became friends with a common goal.
“In my middle school and even starting out high school, I was noticing there’s not a lot of computer science exposure for students at a young age,” Vivan said. “It’s such an important field for the future. I think it’s almost integral in any profession to have some background in working with computers at the most basic level. We thought we needed to boost this exposure for our younger students of Pittsburgh.”
Thomas and Vivan didn’t meet until they were students at the academy.
“After meeting him, I got more into computer science,” Thomas said. “At Shady Side, we have these wonderful computer science courses. I think that’s not the case for most of the public high schools in Pittsburgh.”
They founded shady.Hacks , an eight-hour programming competition, or hack-a-thon, where middle and high school students come to the academy to solve one of the world’s pressing issues using hardware and software. This year’s event is scheduled for April 5. The main goal is to have students from different backgrounds and communities compete, compute and connect.
Signing up is free, and Shady Side provides supplies such as 3D printers, controllers, laptops, phones, VR headsets and more, so no team is left out.
Competitors can also bring their own hardware and software. The focus of the competition is revealed on the day of the event.
“We announce the topic (that day) so people can not have something prebuilt, and we can ensure what they do is essentially all done on the day of competition,” Thomas said.
Organizers understand a complete product or solution may not be completely finished in eight hours.
“A lot of it is the idea itself,” Vivan said. “It’s important to recognize at this level, us kids don’t have all the necessary skills. We’re trying to promote that initial (problem-solving) interest.
The first hack-a-thon took place last year.
Inaugural competition
More than 50 students from about 15 different districts participated in the inaugural shady.Hacks.
Thomas recalled seeing a line of competitors a few minutes before doors opened and was blown away by the support.
“That’s when I really felt like people care about this,” he said. “You never know if the amount of people that sign up will actually translate into the amount of people being at your event.”
Teams were challenged to address healthcare.
One group tried to demonetize health care to increase access. Another created a healthcare literacy website, and another focused on ways of predicting illnesses.
Professors from Carnegie Mellon, Amazon Web Services and the University of Pittsburgh assisted participants via master classes and help stations. A few also served as judges alongside a Google research team member.
The event raised $2,000. The grand prize was a paid internship with California-based Enact Solar. It was awarded to a senior from Pine-Richland.
Dawson Haytock, academy computer science department head, was one of the judges.
He said he was impressed with the competition as well as Thomas and Vivan’s organization and drive.
“It doesn’t just happen,” Haytock said about the event. “They had to dig in. Calling people, getting judges and going around the school and getting support from the school. I’m very impressed with these guys.
“We want people, when they come on campus, to have a friendly place and a place where they can enjoy their experience here. They do see what we have here. They see our maker space. They see our campus. Most of all we just want them to enjoy their time here and to be good hosts for them.”
Thomas said they have learned a lot from last year and have made improvements this time around, such as offering all participants free T-shirts and food at the competition, made possible via contributions from the academy’s finance club.
Thomas and Vivan also got an outreach boost from computer science club president and sophomore Boden Moraski.
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“Technology, if we really look at it, is oftentimes what drives societal progress and things like that forward,” Boden said. “If we look at ways that we can impact the world that can really make a difference, even if you don’t have the backing or the circumstances that some people may, oftentimes it is technology that is able to make these broad scale societal changes and have the impacts that you want to.”
Boden, who moved from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh’s Oakland neighborhood and is in his first year at the academy, helped the team contact computer science teachers at 40 school districts and posted a lot on social media, among other efforts.
“I’ve already participated in a number of hack-a-thons,” he said. “I’ve been interested in computer science and technology for a while and have built stuff. I’ve always viewed them as really nice and impactful events. In looking at it from a new perspective, not as a competitor or as someone who’s participating but as someone who’s organizing it, that really inspired me to notice (how it can help others).”
Shady Side has about 30 members in its computer science club, including about 12 regularly active members.
Sophomore Suhaan Tammana of Cranberry is one of the active members. He said Thomas and Vivan have made an impact on many students’ lives.
“I came from North Allegheny to Shady Side my freshman year, so I was able to connect with them easily,” Suhaan said. “They opened the doors to lots of new kids and got a lot of people with outreach. … They’re not like leaders. They’re like friends to me. They’re really kind.”
More than 80 students are expected to participate in this year’s competition.
Boden said he looks forward to seeing what innovative solutions teams come up with for this year’s topic.
There will be four high school and three middle school awards with the top prize again being a paid internship.
Spots are still available for competitors, volunteers and sponsors.