Technology is leaving the digital world and making an impact on the community.

Hackathon, a series of innovative events hosted by the Syracuse Technology Garden, kicked off on Saturday and ended Sunday at the headquarters of ProLiteracy, a non-profit organization that provides learning opportunities to increase adult literacy. It was the first of four Hackathons that will occur this fall, including a virtual 60-day challenge hosted by AT&T.

ProLiteracy, the sponsor and host of the first Hackathon, teamed up with Tech Garden, a local technology and startup hub, to bring 25 innovators, coders and designers together to collaborate and tackle adult literacy in the community.

“The teams self-select based on the skills they have and their interests,” said Tony Kershaw, the innovation specialist at Tech Garden. “The idea is to focus all of these teams on a particular problem so the solution they create has context.”

After noticing a general trend of community-oriented projects in previous Hackathons, Kershaw said the context for this year’s Hackathon would be based on civic action.

“It’s because of the culture in upstate New York and the passion developers have for the community here,” Kershaw said.

Mike Vormwald, a participant of the Hackathon and a software developer at 3Pound Health, said that his team was working on a program in which people could provide financial support for literacy programs.

“The idea is that a bunch of people could support adult learners using a crowd funding platform,” said Vormwald, whose team is expecting the platform, literacy.io, to go live after its initial testing period.

Vormwald’s project is just one of many that went under construction throughout the weekend, as teams gathered throughout the ProLiteracy headquarters to develop apps, video services and other creative platforms to serve adult learners.

Erica Richmond, an intern at Tech Garden, said many of these platforms have been focused on making it fun for adults learning to read.

“Game-ifying, turning learning into a game, has been a big concept in the community lately and we’re applying it toward literacy as well,” said Richmond, a sophomore citizenship and civic engagement major at Syracuse University.

Richmond supported Kershaw with the planning and execution of this Hackathon. She also helped bring the civic engagement perspective to the technology environment.

“When I think of Hackathon, I think of a bunch of just techie guys and girls getting together,” Richmond said. “But we bring a social problem in and say, ‘Use your knowledge in the tech world to alleviate this social issue.’”

Adult illiteracy — the social issue brought into this weekend’s Hackathon — has been particularly important to the Syracuse community.

“Syracuse is ground zero for the adult literacy movement,” said Kevin Morgan, president & CEO of ProLiteracy. “It’s time to take it to the next level.”

As the weekend continued, the participants created, innovated and designed their way in hopes of winning the grand prize: a $2,500 cash reward. Page Turner won the top prize with its demo involving a mobile phone app that reads along with books for adult learners.

Richmond went on to mention that the world of literacy is in itself complex and more than just learning words.

“The important thing I learned today was that literacy is not just reading and writing,” she said on Saturday. “It’s not just numbers, it’s learning how to navigate the world.”

Thus the challenge for designers, programmers and software developers from all over the central New York area were put to the test to create and innovate unique technologies that will eventually allow illiterate adults to navigate the world more effectively.

Said Richmond: “I think it’s just seeing if it can transform into a product or a real concept of how these two worlds (technology and literacy) interact; I know they can.”

Published on September 15, 2014 at 12:01 am

Contact Jesse: jlnich02@syr.edu