Use your design and programming skills to make a difference!
Parsons The New School for Design, in collaboration with the UN Global Pulse, will be hosting New York City’s first Random Hacks of Kindness (RHoK) event. RHoK is an initiative that brings together volunteer software developers and experts in disaster risk management for a weekend-long “hackathon” to create software solutions that can help mitigate or respond to disasters around the world and help save lives. At the NYC event we are looking to form several teams, each made up of programmers, Parsons students, and subject matter experts from the areas of disaster risk reduction and management.
To sign up for RHoK NYC, visit http://www.rhok.org/events/rhok-2/new-york-ny-u-s-a/.
Further inquiries can be directed to Mathan Ratinam at ratinamm@newschool.edu.
Random Hacks of Kindness is a community of developers, geeks, and tech-savvy do-gooders around the world, working to develop software solutions that respond to the challenges facing humanity today. It was founded in 2009 by a dedicated team of individuals from Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, NASA, and The World Bank. In addition to New York, RHoK events are taking place across the U.S. and internationally. Through satellite technology, program organizers will attempt to connect participants in the various cities with others as the charrette progresses.
The first RHoK event was held in Mountain View, California, in 2009 and resulted in applications that were later used on the ground during the devastating earthquakes in Haiti and Chile. The second RHoK hackathon, in 2010, was held simultaneously in six countries around the world, and one of the winning applications – a tool that allows engineers to easily visualize landslide risk to help guide urban and rural development and building planning – is already being piloted in the Caribbean.
RANDOM HACKS OF KINDNESS
Saturday–Sunday, December 4–5, 2010
8:00 am – 6:00 pm
Tishman Auditorium (Saturday Morning), 66 W. 12th St.
Theresa Lang Student Center (Saturday Afternoon/Sunday), 55 W. 13th St.
