Thank you to Iberus for hosting this event. thank you to our classmates.

We were raised in the public housing projects known as Hazard Park in East Los Angeles.

Gang members “were taught that you can’t go to the end of the street, you can’t walk on the other side of the freeway, you can’t cross the train tracks, no white/black people.”

Now imagine that your needs were treated as they were invisible because its too risky and time-consuming to raise any awareness about the digital divide due to poverty-stricken neighborhood and gang-infested members back then. How would you educate the children...and that is when i saw that the best way was to educate the parents.

That was not a possibility until my mom attended a computer training class for parents while we were attending Murchison Elementary School. When she completed the class, the training program gave all the parents a Gateway Desktop computer and that’s how we first got started with computers and learn how to use it.

We continued through the Los Angeles Unified System District, the second largest public education system throughout the country, and later graduated from Lincoln High School.

It wasn’t until my sister second year of attending college, she signed up for a robotic class. She blossomed under the support of Dr. Espinosa who taught her about micro-controllers and this laid the groundwork to pursue her goal in technology. Her teacher recommend her to tryout meetup groups to further her goal in the field of technology.

Penelope didn’t want to take this journey alone, so she grabbed me to go into tech with her.

We grew up playing soccer together, learning how to ride the motorcycle together, so why not go into tech together.

She kept talking about this one site call meetup. I was convinced it was a dating website. I told her to sign me up but if we found out we are going out on a double date when we get there, she better be prepared to take care of the both of them because I will leave.

When we got there on our motorcycle and walked up to the building and saw the sign hackathon. Penelope what did you sign me up for. A hackathon?

Our First Hackathon (slide)
Explanation: It is an industry term in the tech world
Designers, engineers, developers, marketers, and students with a cool idea comes together and collaborate to make a great mobile app and or hardware prototype using the latest technology within 24 – 48 hours.

Back to Story (slide)
Now that you guys know that. You need to know that I didn’t know that when I was walking into that hackathon. All I saw where guys eating pizza and huddled in groups with their computers. I look to my sister said to her “Penelope are they going to hack into our computer! We only have one you know.”
She told me that we are going to form a team and go to the workshops on how to make a app.
So we found a team and didn’t notice that 12 hours have passed by, it was so late, my mom calls!

Mija, where are you?
Me: We are working on an app.
Mom: On a Saturday night?
Me: Yes. We are here with other people in this tech competition. Oh and we are not going to be back at night.
Mom: Where are you going to sleep?
Me: I see them sleeping on the chairs and sofas here.
Mom: How long will it be?
Me: The hackathon was a 24 hours event.
Mom: Prove it.
So we ending up skyping and showing here around the event. Saying hi to the nice hackers and sleepy people.
Mom: One more question: how are you paying for food?
Me: Oh there is free food.
Mom: Okay great. Have fun!
Wow that was quick!
And we didn’t look back and continue to go to hackathon. It was funny because our parents thought we were going to nightclubs all the time.
But then they realized that we were really going to hackathons and saw the good influence on us. It challenged us, learn how to code, stayed in a safe place and eat food.

Two Years Later (slide)

Going to many hackathons, it completely redefine our relationship with technology.

Hackathons help bridge that digital divide (slide)
This exposure was important. It was the one event that we knew for students like us could try out the latest hardware, APIs, and software. Hardware is pricy and certain software have expensive licenses. But at these hackathons they provide the hardware and the latest software you can tinker with.

You had no real chance to meet with awesome tech companies and learning how to use their latest technologies in person. You have to survey through very competitive internships to more developer skills. Now you can sign up for a hackathon and learn how to achieve those latest skills. You meet great developers and great experts who showed you how to use their product or service in their workshops within a few hours.

We wanted to head to Las Vegas for the AT&T developer summit because it was help the same week as International CES. We knew there were going to be great sponsors, great mentors and the latest developments in technology.

We couldn’t drive the motorcycle because we would not make it in one piece. Luckily there was a hacker bus sponsored by AT&T (Thank you Alex and Ben from AT&T for being so thoughtful) that would take us straight from Los Angeles to the Palm Casino in Las Vegas.

Our next step was to bring some friends from East LA along. There was no way we were going to another year to hackathons without mentoring and grooming hackers from our barrio.

This 24-hour hackathon was a nonstop test of skill and stamina. Hundreds of developers, many of them tech industry veterans, attended workshops run by experts and were provided the latest software, APIs and hardware. The participants raced to build apps or wearable technology for smart homes, smart glasses or for the smartphone. 

What we focus on was not on building the latest dating app but we wanted to build a prototype that would make a difference.

Our winning prize was called the...

BODY CAM HACK(slide)
Our winning prize was called the Body Cam Hack which can be used by police officers, journalists, or those chasing storms.
The Michael Brown case really affected public opinion that more people now are in favor of body cams on the police force. Body cameras should not be stiff as the cameras on their police car dashboards. They have to be as smart as their mobile counterpart unit. People have seen smart watches, smart houses, and smart watches but they have not seen smart body cams. People should see this as the new face of wearable technology — a body cam that can use face-tracking technology.”