Last weekend, teams of technologists partnered with selected nonprofits in a hackathon hosted by GlobalHack. FLOURISH, powered by Generate Health, was one of the organizations selected to benefit from this event. The goal of the hackathon called Code with a Cause is for the technologists to assist nonprofits in meeting a pre-identified specific software need.
The hackathon began Friday evening, where the selected nonprofits presented their technology challenge, and hackathon participants paired with the project they were interested in. FLOURISH’s identified need came from the Infant Health Action Team, specifically their Portable Crib Partnership, where they align the region’s portable crib providers to better equip families with cribs and encourage safe sleep practices for parents.
The Partners highlighted the current challenge of tracking which organizations have cribs and which do not, so that no family would have to end up on a waiting list. Additionally, these partner agencies handing out cribs did not have a way to acquire each other’s eligibility criteria and schedules.
Two technologists selected this project to work on throughout the weekend, where they built a tool friendly to desktops and phones where Portable Crib Partner Agencies could have easier access to each other’s information, as well as families seeking cribs, and crib availability.
After two long days and nights of work, the event closed with final presentations from each team, and celebration of the projects accomplished and the causes contributed to.
The completed tool will be passed off for Partners to utilize after some tweaking, training, and pilot testing takes place.