CodeGirls TechFest was held at the Muhammad Ali Jinnah University Karachi on November 26 to connect young techies from different institutes and provide an opportunity to showcase their skills and compete with each other. The event was a huge success, as 97 out of 100 registered participants showed up to compete. The candidates were all women, students, or young professionals from renowned universities and institutes.
At the TechFest, a startup hackathon and four competitions were conducted in web development, software testing, UX/UI, and mobile app development. The participants were asked to choose only one competition or the hackathon.
Before the event, four virtual workshops were conducted to help gear up participants for the hackathon. Sanam Khan conducted the workshop on “How to give stellar presentations,” and Hira Wajahat Malik gave insights on “Business Model Canvas.” Faiza Yousuf on “Product Development 101,” and Shamim Rajani on” Customer Development.”
Dr. Shaukat Wasi (Associate Dean – MAJU Computing Faculty) gave the event’s opening remarks. Then Shamim Ranjani (Founder – CodeGirls, and COO – GenetechSolutions) discussed the goals, objectives, and progress of CodeGirls.
Our first Keynote speaker Mr. Taha Hussain (Leadership Coach – Taha’s Method), delivered a phenomenal speech on “With Great Responsibility Comes Great Power.”
Samana Mehmood (Program Manager – CodeGirls) joined the stage and gave a breakdown of the format of the competitions and hackathons. Then participants were led to their corresponding labs. To assist participants throughout the competition and hackathon, mentors were present. The mentors supported the participants who felt lost at any stage and ensured a fair playing field. Additionally, the mentors could better identify any technical issues and have them fixed, saving the participants’ time. Following are the names of mentors for each competition.
Web Development: Yusra Rao and Taha Fatima
UI/UX: Mashhood Nabi
Mobile App Development: Syed Sadiq
Software Testing: Tabassum Wajid
Hackathon: Anum Kamran and Sameer Ahmed
After the competitions and hackathon, our second Keynote speaker Ms. Sophia Hasnain (CEO – Linked things), talked about IoT and its applications in the local ecosystem.
Next, CodeGirls (Phase 1 and 2) Best performers for 2022 were awarded Laptops and Tablets. Below are the names of phase 1 and phase 2 top performers
Phase 1 Cohort 10 Top performers
1st position: Zehra Batool
2nd position: Sakina Tejani
3rd position: Hudesa Zehra
Phase 2 Top Performers
For Flutter, Sabahat Zehra was the top performer
For MERN, Fatima Khurram was the top performer
For Python, S. Hijab Zehra was the top performer
For Microsoft Dynamics Power, Sabika Zehra was the top performer
Presentations from the hackathon came next. Hackathon had various themes: Skill-building, Access to opportunities, Community Building, Health and Wellness, Mass-Transit, Workplace Safety, and Financial Inclusion. Participants had to present a prototype of their solution in addition to a pitch deck that included a business model canvas and value proportion map.
During the presentations, Faiza Yousuf (Co-founder – CodeGirls, Founder – WomenInTechPK) and Yumna Asim were intensively processing the live results that were coming in from the labs. There were prize giveaways and results announcements at the end of the hackathon presentations. Cash prizes of 50k were given to the winners and 25k to the runner-up in each category. Following are the names of winners and runner-ups for each type.
Web Development
- Winner: Kiran Shakeel
- Runner-up: Khair-un-Nissa
Software Testing
- Winner: Danella Patrick
- Runner-up: Noorah Ahmed
Mobile App
- Winner: Faiza Zafar
- Runner-up: Hadia Malick
UI/UX
- Winner: Taskeen Zehra
- Runner-up: Sadaf Zehra
Hackathon
- Winners: Ayesha Zia and Noor Afshan for (BeeSafe: An app that works on women’s safety in Pakistan by detecting a keyword and alarming the trusted contact of the user to provide instant help)
- Runners-up: Hina Shabbir and Sabeen Murtaza for (Happy Hands: Day Care Service that allows mothers to monitor their child’s learning and care in real-time)
The ceremony concluded with a small token of appreciation presented to the MAJU team and MAJU Volunteers. A token of appreciation was also presented to the panel of esteemed judges for each category during the event.
- Faizan Darwesh, Taqi Kirmani, and Sakina Abbas for the Mobile App Development.
- Aadil Raza and Adeeba Moin for the User Interface Design Competition.
- Shabbir Bhojani, Urooj Fatima, Mehreen Hussain, and Zulqarnain Jabbar for the Web Development Competition.
- Samira Raza, Faiza Yousuf, and Muhammad Taha, for the Software Testing Competition
- Shamim Rajani, Nida Athar, Adil Kazmi, and Sukaina Abbas for the Hackathon.
Fostering opportunities for women in tech by bringing together the industry and academia has always been CodeGirls’ number one mission. CodeGirls TechFest 2022 has shown that women have extraordinary potential to join the industry and have a great future in the tech ecosystem.
