Hackathon

The ThINKER LAB Skills Competition was a contest, developed within the Thinker Lab project. It was the opportunity to participate in an experience based on the active learning and linked to innovation and creativity, open to all students interested in STEMs, attending courses EQF 3-4-5.

The ThINKER LAB partnership aims at increasing the range of educational opportunities by constructing learning pathways that are closely linked to collaborative learning processes, based on low cost laboratories and less dependent on technical knowledge.

ThINKER LAB objectives are: to increase the social inclusion of students ; to increase STEM skills through active methodologies and working techniques based on Tinkering and on the creation and use of low-cost fablabs ; to promote sustainability, adopting recycled materials.

The acronym STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) is a term used to refer to the science-technology disciplines and related competences and courses of study.

ThINKER LAB is an open community where teachers, students and hobbyists can find and share STEM projects easily reproducible in school fablabs or in maker labs.

Hackathon 2023

The Thinker Lab skills competition was developed in:

SWEDEN – TORSLANDA in Training Centre at Volvo Cars on 14/03/2023
SLOVENIA – LJUBLJANA in SIC on 20/03/2023
SPAIN – DERIO in Politeknika Ikastegia Txorierri on 28/03/2023
ITALY – ALBA (CN) in Apro Formazione on 21/04/2023
FINLAND – LAHTI in Salpaus on 10/04/2023 and 21/04/2023

The challenges proposed were unveiled by the organizers during the opening session.

Teams had 5 (five) hours available to develop the ideas.

Every participating team had a virtual budget of 100 € without shipping costs and could buy components only on the e-commerce platform indicated by the organizer.

It was particularly appreciated the use of as many recycled parts as possible.

At the end of the challenge participants had to fill in the form available on the Thinker Lab website to explain the solution found and to upload a short PowerPoint presentation (max 6 slides) or a video (max 3 minutes).

Winners of the national Thinker Lab skills competition competed in an international contest.

The national winning team presented their solutions on 10-11th May 2023 during the Thinker Lab international skills competition in Finland.

Within 31st May 2023, the winning team had to create a prototype of its solution/project.

And the winner is...

The Slovenian team’s project was awarded as the winner of the 2023 ThinkerLab Hackathon: https://thinker-lab.eu/projects/items/packagesorting

The projects and developments were judjed by the members of the jury based on the following criteria:

Originality, creativity, and innovation of proposed solutions and concepts
Application of STEMs– number of STEMs included in the solution/project
Budget management in use of technical parts
Sustainability (use of recycled material, green/eco-friendly material, second hand material)
Teamwork

The jury was made up of 2 experts teachers (1 involved in Thinker Lab project and one not directly involved).