Find out what happened at the third Techfugees Australia hackathon in November 2016, in which young refugees, entrepreneurs and the tech community came together in the Parramatta district in Sydney to find solutions to the challenges faced by those newly arriving in Australia.
The #Hack4Refugees event kicked off with insights from four young people who talked about their experiences and set the scene.
Then, over the course of a weekend, teams or four or five people worked with refugees to create new businesses, business models and minimum viable products. With intensive mentoring and support, the teams were able to create, validate and pitch their solutions by late Sunday afternoon. There was a focus throughout on doing more than just surviving – a common theme was how to settle into a new country and thrive long term.
The winner of the $15k prize was Art Crew, with their idea of designing murals to proudly and publicly celebrate multiculturalism.
Also in the running were:
- Inspirational story platform STEPS
- A Fair Go, a platform to help businesses hire refugees
- Covered, linking new Australians with career mentors
- Twitterbot @RefugeeBiz to support new businesses
- One step at a time, linking up Australians old and new
- Translation guide First Days
Get involved with Techfugees Australia
With three events behind them, founders Annie Parker, Nicole Williamson and Anne-Marie Elias are starting to see the positive impact of the Techfugees Australia events, particularly on the younger people.
More information
Follow the Hack4Refugees Storify from day one and day two
See Anne-Marie Elias on Codesigning Solutions to Settlement
Read Serina Gill’s blog post
Read Gavin Heaton’s write-up
See the submissions from Techfugees Australia
Join Techfugees Australia on Facebook