In March 2025, the Hack4dev initiative successfully ran the SKA Data Challenge at the AfAS 2025 Data Science Hackathon. This marked a significant milestone in preparing African postgraduate astronomers to tackle the data challenges of the Square Kilometre Array (SKA). To support the global astronomy community in preparing for the massive data volumes expected from the SKA telescopes, the SKA … Read More
From October 23-25, Hack4dev hosted its first Data Science Trainers’ Hackathon at WITS University in Johannesburg, South Africa, marking the initial phase of the Data Science Hackathons program, which will continue with regional hackathons from February to April 2025. The call for trainers, launched in June 2024, attracted over 60 applicants, with 14 trainers selected to participate from countries including … Read More
From 21–22 April 2024, a 2-day Data Science Hackathon took place after the AfAS conference, featuring about 15 participants. The event, hosted on the ilifu cloud platform, focused on the same challenge as the BAWG Hackathon: distinguishing between active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and star-forming galaxies (SFGs) using machine learning techniques. Participants worked in teams, receiving mentorship and tutorials, before presenting … Read More
The BRICS Astronomy Working Group Hackathon took place from 18–19 October 2023 at the South African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO) in Cape Town. It brought together 27 postgraduate students from all BRICS countries, focusing on clustering astronomical data using machine learning. Participants worked on distinguishing between active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and star-forming galaxies (SFGs) using data from the MeerKAT MIGHTEE survey. … Read More
The Dawn of Data Stars Hackathon took place on 27–28 September 2023 at Rhodes High School, following a five-week Python training program. Around 20 students, who had been learning Python through partnerships with SoloLearn and CodeX, participated in the hackathon focused on emotion classification using machine learning. The challenge allowed students to apply their Python skills in a real-world setting … Read More
From 7-10 February 2023, the first Hackathon for the Andean Region was held virtually, organized by DARA Big Data and Hack4dev in collaboration with the National University of Engineering (UNI) in Peru. The event, focused on data science, featured two main challenges: galaxy classification and sentiment analysis of Twitter data related to astronomy. Aimed at senior STEM students and professionals … Read More
From 18-20 March 2023, Wits University hosted a 3-day hackathon following a conference organized by AfAS. The event gathered around 130 undergraduate and postgraduate students, along with young professionals from across Africa, all with Python experience and a passion for data science and machine learning. Participants worked on the ilifu cloud computing platform in teams of five to tackle two … Read More
From 28 February to 3 March 2023, DARA Big Data and its partners in the Hack4dev project, in conjunction with the University of KwaZulu-Natal College of Teaching and Learning, hosted a 4-day Data Science Hackathon at the UKZN Howard campus. The event welcomed undergraduate and postgraduate students, as well as young professionals from across KZN with Python experience and an … Read More
Dr. Lameck Amugongo, a former DARA Big Data PhD student, has been advocating for compulsory coding lessons in schools to enhance technology skills among young people. He previously tutored at DARA Big Data workshops and organized the NUST-DARA Data Science School, a week-long event from 25-29 April 2022 at the University of Namibia (UNAM) with nearly 200 applicants. The event … Read More
Carringtone Kinyanjui and Bonface Osoro, former DARA Big Data and DARA Project students, conducted a 5-day workshop from 28-30 July 2021 in Nairobi to share their skills and encourage others in Kenya to develop similar expertise. Held at the Technical University of Kenya (TUK) with academic support from Prof. Paul Baki, the gender-balanced event hosted 16 participants out of 400 … Read More
DARA Big Data hosted its first event in Mozambique in March 2021, a 3-day hackathon at Eduardo Mondlane University (UEM) in Maputo. Led by Ramiro Saide and Dionisio Candido, with support from Dr. Nikhita Madhanpall and Dr. Claudio Paulo of UEM’s Department of Physics, the event had been postponed due to COVID-19 but resumed after a month. The hackathon featured … Read More
21 – 22 April 2024 Registration Deadline: 15 January 2024 We are excited to announce a 2-day Data Science Hackathon that will take place on 21 – 22 April 2024, after the AfAS conference. This hackathon will offer participants the chance to experience the entire pipeline of machine learning, from conception to application. To support their work, we will utilise … Read More
