{"id":897613,"date":"2026-10-28T14:32:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-28T14:32:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/897613\/"},"modified":"2026-10-28T14:32:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-28T14:32:09","slug":"hacksxii-turns-imagination-into-innovation-wm-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/897613\/","title":{"rendered":"&hacksXII turns imagination into innovation \u2013 W&M News"},"content":{"rendered":"

The following story originally appeared<\/a> on the website for W&M\u2019s School of Computing, Data Sciences & Physics. \u2013 Ed.<\/p>\n

What happens when students from different academic backgrounds come together for a weekend of creativity, collaboration and coding?<\/p>\n

At William & Mary\u2019s annual &hacks competition, the possibilities are nearly endless.<\/p>\n

Held in Integrated Science Center 4 from Sept. 26-27, this year\u2019s hackathon brought together students, alumni and faculty to explore how computing and artificial intelligence can transform imaginative ideas into innovative solutions. With a theme of \u201cAI and Imagination,\u201d the event challenged participants to think beyond traditional applications of technology and discover new ways to put AI to work.<\/p>\n

The competition attracted students from a wide range of disciplines, including business, computer science, social sciences and linguistics. By the end of the weekend, participants had developed 34 projects spanning everything from health sciences to interactive English language learning games.<\/p>\n

For student organizers Lynn Egan and Libby Knight, one of the primary goals was to demonstrate that AI can be more than a tool for generating content.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur idea was to not just have AI be this generative thing,\u201d said Knight. Instead, they wanted participants to explore how AI could help them accomplish specific tasks and develop practical applications.<\/p>\n

Making computing accessible to everyone<\/p>\n

While hackathons traditionally attract students with programming experience, &hacks organizers worked to make this year\u2019s competition accessible to participants of all skill levels.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople were able to go to (Major League Hacking) mentors, who are our co-sponsor of the event, and we had a social meet with people so you can meet people in other majors,\u201d said Egan.<\/p>\n

Special competition tracks, including one focused on linguistics, encouraged students to explore the connections between computing and other fields. Faculty and students from linguistics supported the event throughout the weekend, helping participants discover new ways to apply technology to the study of language.<\/p>\n

Reflecting the theme, many teams incorporated AI into their projects.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think some people who had computer science foundations were using it to just speed along coding processes by telling it what sort of architecture to build instead of hard coding things,\u201d said Egan. \u201cBut I think for beginners, it really walked them through how to set up an API and how to work software, what you need to download, what\u2019s an IDE, and stuff like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Knight said the integration of AI helped lower barriers for students with limited programming experience.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven if you\u2019re not super techie, we allowed people to use AI and it allowed them to do a lot more than what they usually would have been able to do without it,\u201d stated Knight.<\/p>\n

The result was an environment where students could experiment with new technologies, learn from one another and pursue projects that might otherwise have seemed beyond their technical abilities.<\/p>\n

Where computing meets linguistics<\/p>\n

One example of this interdisciplinary approach was Etymogle, an etymology-based daily word guessing game created by Bennett Matuszewski, a senior double majoring in computer science and business analytics.<\/p>\n

\"ABennett Matuszewski \u201927 receives his prize \u201ccheck\u201d for finishing second overall with his project, Etymogle. (CDSP photo)<\/p>\n

The project, which earned the competition\u2019s overall runner-up award, combined Matuszewski\u2019s programming skills with his personal interest in linguistics and education.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think linguistics is an interesting thing, I enjoy learning about it in my free time,\u201d Matuszewski explained. \u201cI figured it\u2019d just be a good opportunity to use my computer science skills and kind of combine them with the linguistics and education route and then just turn it into something that\u2019s just fun to play.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like many projects this year, Matuszewski incorporated AI into his development process by pulling online data and then using an AI assistant to help select fonts and shape the visual design of the Etymogle platform.<\/p>\n

\u201cI definitely relied on AI to kind of bring my vision to life,\u201d Matuszewski said.<\/p>\n

His project illustrated one of the central ideas behind this year\u2019s competition, that combining technical knowledge with interests in other disciplines can lead to creative applications of emerging technologies.<\/p>\n

Exploring new possibilities through collaboration<\/p>\n

Beyond the projects and awards, &hacks provided students with an opportunity to step outside their academic comfort zones, collaborate with peers from different disciplines and discover new ways to apply their skills.<\/p>\n

\"\"A competitor describes his project at &hacksXII. (CDSP photo)<\/p>\n

The event also reflected William & Mary\u2019s broader commitment to interdisciplinary learning, demonstrating how the liberal arts and sciences, combined with computing, can help students approach challenges from different perspectives.<\/p>\n

For Knight, the experience is especially valuable for students still exploring their academic interests and future career paths.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s a great idea for students who don\u2019t really know what they exactly want to do with their major or career,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

By encouraging students to experiment, collaborate and turn their ideas into working projects, &hacks demonstrated that innovation isn\u2019t limited to any one major or field of study. Sometimes, all it takes is a little imagination and a willingness to try something new.<\/p>\n

Eva Kalajian, CDSP<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The following story originally appeared on the website for W&M\u2019s School of Computing, Data Sciences & Physics. \u2013…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":897614,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[191,74],"class_list":["post-897613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-computing","tag-computing","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/897613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=897613"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/897613\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/897614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=897613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=897613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=897613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}