Major League Hacking’s LHD: Build | My “No Code” Hackathon Experience

Hey, party people! Welcome back to my blog. It’s been so long since the last update that I practically graduate from Rutgers tomorrow. Okay, not tomorrow - but it blows my mind that the last time I posted was when I committed to RBS, and now I’m months away from receiving my B.S. in Marketing. Crazy, huh?

You blink and the next thing you know you’ve lived through a pandemic, a whole lot of protests, and continued political discourse. Anyway, it hasn’t been all that bad! In the past year, I’ve also had my first professional internship, made the Dean’s List every semester, and even achieved my first 4.0 in college. Yay!

But I digress- one of the best parts of 2021 so far has been the time I’ve spent participating in MLH’s Local Hack Day: Build. In the past week, I’ve joined a bunch of live streams (and set up a Twitch profile), worked on several Devpost projects, and also hosted a few Zoom parties where I got to meet hackers from all over the world and create an MS Paint masterpiece! (check it out below)

Nothing like a late-night #MSPaint Zoom Party recreating a Bob Ross painting for #LocalHackDay.

What do we think about this happy little accident? Here's the video we followed: https://t.co/Mhc2xJPqLS #digitaldesign #artist #creative #painting #hackathon pic.twitter.com/eA5Hzdzr31

— Jianna | jiannamariel.com (@jiannamariel) January 14, 2021

I got to have all these experiences all thanks to my awesome guild! This was my first time participating in a hackathon as part of a larger team and I’m so grateful for all those who decided to join ESTechies. Believe it or not, this group was originally just supposed to be a team made up of me and a few of my friends for us to hack together for the first time.

Ironically, because of our crazy schedules - all of my friends are either in school full-time or working and getting their Masters degrees also - we never got to actually work on a hack together. In fact, I spent the entire week without touching a single line of code (Well, as long as you don’t count the minor front-end updates I made on this site).

On that note, I must say that this has so far been one of my favorite hackathons to date. If there’s one thing that this week has taught me is that I’m realizing more and more that a role in Product may be the best fit for me. Being at the intersection of marketing, design, tech, and management has been an absolute joy and I’m excited to see to see where things go!

While we’re on the topic, I want to take a moment to remind everyone to pursue opportunities despite any reservations (within reason and while staying mindful of your wellness) you may have. I decided to create ESTechies on a whim, and through it, I’ve found a mini-community of designers and devs from all over the world. In fact, I’ll be participating in StarHacks next week with one of my guild mates!

Doing well in this hackathon was never my goal, so it was an absolute surprise to see us consistently in the Top 10. By day 2, I was absolutely invested and I’m just so happy for the greater MLH community who shared their passion and enthusiasm for all things digital (and blahajs).

And now it's official (as of Jan 18th 12 pm EST), ESTechies finished in the Top 10 for LHD: Build. So proud of this guild and every other hacker that took the opportunity to develop their coding skills, work on projects, and make new friends!