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mISSION sTATEMENT
mISSION sTATEMENT
As students and alumni of Harvey Mudd College and organizers of Hack for Black Lives, we fully support the Black Lives Matter movement and protests against police brutality and systemic racism. The murders of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and countless others are events that are the product of a flawed society; the pain and trauma from the oppression of Black communities has burdened Black people for generations and has continued for far too long. Although only members of the Black community will understand the systemic racism and unacceptable mistreatment that the Black community endures, everyone must be a part of the solution. We must all come together to end the oppression and mistreatment of Black communities by using our platforms to demand systemic change and leveraging our skills and passions to create solutions that support the Black Lives Matter movement.
By organizing this hackathon, we challenge you to use your education, skills, and passions to support the Black Lives Matter movement. By signing up for this hackathon, you are accepting our challenge to practice active anti-racism by focusing your skills and passions on developing a solution that supports Black Communities and battles the oppression that they face. As members of a college focused on science and technology, we pledge to use our technical training to develop solutions and tools to support the Black Lives Matter movement. However, we do not want to limit this hackathon to only the technical community. Whether your background is in tech, art, social sciences, or any other field we encourage you to contribute to our mission of ending the systemic racism against Black people and communities. By coming together for one weekend, we will make unbelievable contributions to supporting the Black Lives Matter movement. We challenge and encourage you to be creative, be ambitious, and be the change that our society needs to end racism against Black communities.
What is a hackathon? How will this help the Black Lives Matter movement?
What is a hackathon? How will this help the Black Lives Matter movement?
Traditionally, hackathons are events where people take a few days out of their lives to focus on a project that they are passionate about! Most often, the projects are technical and involve some form of engineering. Hack for Black Lives, at it's core, is a hackathon, but differs from what many would view as a traditional hackathon in a few keys ways.
Firstly, Hack for Black Lives is a hackathon with a specific mission of supporting the Black Lives Matter movement. The first way in which Hack for Black Lives aims to achieve this is ensuring that all participants leave the hackathon better educated about the system racism and injustices that the Black Lives Matter movement is addressing, and about their role in the solution. The second way in which Hack for Black Lives aims to support the Black Lives Matter movement is by providing hackers with the necessary resources and opportunity to apply their education and skills to actually create something that will support the Black Lives Matter movement.
Furthermore, Hack for Black Lives differs from a traditional hackathon because we do not envision the projects being entirely technical based. You do not need a background in any form of engineering or technical skills, you only need the passion to create anything. It could be as simple an educational presentation that you hope to share with people who you think could benefit from it, or it could be a preliminary draft of legislation for the needed change the Black Lives Matter movement is striving for, or it could be a piece of software analyzing the racial biases that certain commonly used algorithms may inherently have. Long story short, bring your skill and passions, whatever they may be, and we will work with you to empower you to create something that supports the Black Lives Matter movement, and to give you the confidence you need to know that you can continue to do so after the completion of the hackathon.
Who are the organizers of Hack for Black Lives?
Who are the organizers of Hack for Black Lives?
The original group of organizers of Hack for Black Lives are a group of students and alumni from Harvey Mudd College in Claremont, California. More importantly, however, we are young adults who are passionate about making the long overdue changes that the Black Lives Matter movement is striving for. We have grown and are continuing to grow our network to garner support from various organizations and individuals to help put on this event, searching for support from all people who are passionate about battling systemic racism against Black people and communities. Interested in partnering with us to help us organize this event? Check our our Partners page for information on how to do so.
*Art by Mary Jessie Celestin, founder of San Jose Strong
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