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The National Incubation Center Islamabad organized Hactivate, a Hackathon for Education on 28th and 29th of July 2018. The 48-hour hackathon was based around education and aimed to expose the youth of Pakistan to the scopes of starting their own businesses. There were more than 20 teams in total, with individuals belonging to various parts of the country, including Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar, Gujranwala etc.
The National Incubation Center had partnered up with a significant number of firms to organize this event, including Ilm Ideas 2, Jazz, Bahria University, The Millennium University College, the National University of Science and Technology (NUST) and Knowledge Platform etc.
The two-day event was jam-packed with hacking sessions, seminars, and ed-talks by some of the biggest names in the tech and education industries of the country. Workshops and panel discussions were among the package as well, which were further complemented by morning yoga sessions to help the participants relax.
Some notable personalities conducting the panel discussion included Faisal Laghari, CEO of LearnOBots, Talha Munir, the Country Manager of Knowledge Platform, Nadya Karim Shaw, Country Representative of World Learning and Noman Bukhari, CTO of Orenda.
Scrutiny of the teams’ pitches was done on the basis of practical plausibility of the idea paired with its application in the field of educational technology.
Winner of Hactivate
At the end of the 48-hour event, Beyond The Classroom emerged as the winner. Their business idea revolved around the development of critical thinking abilities in the youth of the country through a unified learning platform. As promised, the victor was awarded a spot in the National Incubation Center’s 4th cohort, which is due to start next month. The incubation period will last for 12 months, during which they will be provided with a formal working space along with other facilities in a bid for them to develop their idea into an actual business.
Parvez Abbasi, Project Director at the NIC said: “Under Hacktivate, we aim to conduct hackathons in various tech verticals by teaming up with the leaders of that particular industry and give participants a chance to solve the highlighted problems through innovative solutions.”
