Anyone who is a registered high school student (minimum age of 14) in Barcelona and the Greater Metropolitan Area can register to join the SciHack. In the registration, you will be required to add a High School Teacher’s name and contact information (preferably, your Science or Research teacher) who will verify your registration to the SciHack and who will need to accompany you to the closing event if you get in the finals.

Yes, you need to form a team of 3-5 members. You may form a team with your classmates from the same high school or with students from other high schools. However, only one of you (the team leader) has to register the team and only one High School Teacher’s name (preferably, the team leader’s teacher) will be required.

Unfortunately, this hackathon is only for high school students. During the closing event, finalist students will be required to present their school I.D. and a High School Teacher will be required to accompany the students.

No, unfortunately, you won’t be able to change your team members.

It is free! There is no cost to register and participate. Finalists will also be able to join the closing event for free. However, finalists will have to be responsible for their own transportation costs.

Definitely! BIST SciHack is for all high school students! This includes those who have never “hacked" before! All passionate problem solvers are encouraged to join. This hackathon is aimed at helping high school students learn and experience how to utilize the scientific method and design evidence-based solutions to real-world problems.

Explore the challenges and choose according to which challenge you would like (e.g. it might be that you are passionate about a specific challenge or you are interested in trying a challenge you are unfamiliar with)

You do not need to be a coder or data expert to join BIST SciHack. While some of our challenges are technical, others ask you to use your artistic skills, your business acumen, and your historical imaginations! In fact, the most diverse teams are often the most successful. If you would like to try coding, we will be providing resources to help you use building blocks to code and make technical solutions.

The official language is English. The submitted solutions and materials must be in English. However, support will be provided in Catalan and/or Spanish and the English level won’t be taken into account when evaluating your submission. During the mentoring period, most mentors will be able to speak Spanish and/or Catalan. We aim to help all participants contribute to their teams in the most comfortable way possible so do reach out to us if you have any questions regarding the level of English required. If you can read and understand the challenge you can participate!

The preliminary and final submissions will be held online. All registered hackers will be able to participate in the online mentoring sessions. Meanwhile, finalists will have to be physically present to give the final pitches and attend the closing ceremony on site in Barcelona on February 10, 2023.

You are allowed to drop out at any point of the program. Please feel free to email and inform the organizers anytime at bist.sciencehack@gmail.com if you have any issues or concerns.

All attendees, sponsors, partners, volunteers and staff at our hackathon are required to agree and observe with the event’s Code of Conduct. In general, we expect everyone to do the following:

• Behave professionally at all times.
• Be kind to others.
• Behave politely and respectfully through in-person, email and social media interactions.
• Communicate any concerns or grievances with a courteous tone and language.

All participants of the event are required to adhere to the Code of Conduct, which covers guidelines on cheating, plagiarism, discrimination, and harassment. For concerns or questions, please feel free to contact bist.sciencehack@gmail.com

Anything! You can build or make anything whether it is a product, service, algorithm, methodology, etc. as long as it solves your chosen challenge. Some examples are web pages, mobile apps, hardware projects, games, an API, business model, organization… The organizers have provided some resources that you could use but feel free to seek or use your own resources. We only expect solutions to make a real contribution to addressing your chosen challenge.

Teams participating in the science hackathon will be required to submit a presentation or demonstration of their project or solution, as well as a written report or summary outlining the problem being addressed, the approach taken, and the results achieved. Teams may also be required to submit a working prototype or model of their solution, as well as any relevant code or technical documentation. The specific requirements for the deliverables will be provided to teams in advance of the hackathon.

No, solutions can be anything. However, we require you to utilize science or data in designing the solution whether it is a scientific method, technology, or know-how.Regarding the know-how, it could be related to the way business models or policy is made, for example. Your solution could also be based on integrating science with other fields, such as humanities or arts. Therefore, the expected solutions are not restricted to scientific projects.

Projects will mainly be judged based on scientific basis, innovation, overall learning experience, and also, on their usability and design by a panel of selected experts of the challenge.

Yes! There will be several fun prizes for the winners of the hackathon. Prizes will be announced soon.

The intellectual property of what was developed during a hackathon is under the command of the intellect that generated it. Therefore, any novel solutions generated by hackers will be owned by hackers.

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