This article written by CruzHacks team leaders Lia Fung and Glomarie Ramos, and Doug Erickson

CruzHacks is the annual hackathon run by undergraduate students from UC Santa Cruz. Each year, we welcome hundreds of college and high school students interested in developing technology for social good. We strive to empower the next generation of creators by providing the tools, environment, and motivation to plausibly solve real-world problems. Our initiative is to expand diversity in tech by sparking the drive to innovate within all our participants.

CruzHacks 2024's main prize tracks revolved around innovation for social good, with themes including social justice, sustainability, education, and healthcare. The secondary prize categories challenged hackers to push beyond their limits, with rewards for first-time hackers, those who utilized AI, projects with amazing UI/UX, and projects that benefited the UCSC college community.

CruzHacks 2024 hackers got to hear from inspirational speakers including:

• Lila Tretikov, Deputy Chief Technology Officer at Microsoft

• Guy Kawasaki, Chief Evangelist of Canva

• David Hallock, Director of Engineering at Rapid Robotics.

Hackers also had the opportunity to attend a mix of technical and non-technical workshops, as well as fun activities such as cup stacking, throughout the event.

CruzHacks 2024's primary audience was undergraduate students of any major enrolled at a university. However, we did accept younger students, as long as they were enrolled in a secondary school or higher. We also accepted Masters and Ph.D. level students, as well as students from alternative schools such as bootcamps.

You can view all of the final projects at CruzHacks 2024 Project Gallery on Devpost.

Tech Cares Winning Teams

Sustainability 

1st Place

2nd Place

Education

1st Place

Justice

1st Place

2nd Place

Health

1st Place

2nd Place

Category Winners

Best Beginner

Best SlugHack

Best UI/UX

Best AI

Event Metrics

The event metrics were similar to the previous year, with significant improvements on the operations.

Advisors

• Alexi Sevastopoulos

• Dr. Ebonée Williams

• Mark Adams

2024 Board of Directors

• Doug Erickson

• Nathan Westrup

• Amanda Rotella

• Suz Howells

• Mansi Saini

• Nada Miljkovic