Application
If you do have prior coding experience, let us know which languages you’ve used and for how long. We’d also love to hear about any other skills you’d like to use at HackMIT: these could be related to art, music, hardware, design, or anything else you’re interested in! For half my life, I’ve had the opportunity to tinker with technology. I quickly realized that the power of the internet at my fingertips was a level of creation that I could spend my entire life on. Fortunately, I’ve been able to access the world’s most bleeding edge technology, making software for the XR headsets and smartwatches (C#, Unity, Java), all from my rickety chair. Now I spend my time helping others build cool things at a startup called Repl.it, study software engineering at the University of Waterloo, and ponder over how to give people superpowers with AI and biotech.
What do you hack for, and what do you hope to get out of attending HackMIT? Hacking is an act of unprecedented creativity and power. I could provide the utility of a car and the joy of an artist all at once. I have the unique opportunity to spark a feeling of awe and wonder in the people around me.
What better way to demonstrate mastery of a field than to light up the eyes of my friends with it?
HackMIT is special unbounded time for me to explore the different ways I could make the world smile a little bit more. To lean into the cliche, I want to meet the other dreamers there as well. I also want to work on dreams, but that might be a hack for another day.
What is something (it could be a school assignment, extracurricular activity, computer science project, etc) you’ve worked on that you’re proud of, and why? After a local wildfire took my city by storm, I was saddened to see the once beautiful forests of my city turned into ash. Consequently, I made EcoYOLO, an environmental organization to rejuvenate my city.
Throughout our time, we secured partners, sponsors, and awards totaling to $25000 in funding. Over two events in two years, 600 students replanted over 4000 trees. Students were overjoyed to know that their city was rebuilding, and they were a part of that. Other community members saw a regained sense of hope, myself included. We went on to merge with our school’s environmental club so that I could combine my passion of tech and the environment to start working and teaching about environmental innovation.
Describe a time you experienced conflict on a team. How did you find a solution/compromise? About a year ago, I was put on the team to determine the vision for a startup I was working on. My task, along with 3 others, was to answer all of the open questions that were ever asked about the company in just two sentences.
Working remote, each team member meticulously crafted their sentences, however, we later realized that none of our visions aligned either. In a critical decision, it is natural for disagreements to occur. I realized that the disagreements didn’t stem from differing ideals, but from a lack of trust. I organized time for the team to get to know each other better, and with that build trust.
After that, the team was able to work together on building the company vision. I believe that most disagreements stem from a lack of trust, which is why I employ this same strategy in any organization I join.
If you were a candle, what scent would you be and why? Definitely banana. What a crazy story that smell has behind it. If you are interested: https://www.10best.com/interests/food-culture/bananas-arent-good-as-they-were-why-cavendish-gros-michel/