How Will the School of the Future Look Like 
This was the theme of the International Virtual Hackathon (Vickathon) that our high school homeschooler Allyra participated in for the past 4 days. This hackathon had participants from Israel, South Africa, China, the Philippines, and Saudi Arabia.
For the past few days, the students worked together to come up with their idea of how the school of the future will look like. For 2 days, they listened to enrichment lectures and developed their idea with guidance from mentors, and on Day 3, they worked on their own to finalize their presentation.
On Day 4, all the groups presented their pitch in front of everyone and judges scored their ideas. Award-winning ventures were announced on Day 5, and praise God, their group won 3rd Place and the Crowd Favorite Idea! .
It was a blessing to witness how our eldest who was homeschooled from birth was able to share her ideas about innovative education which she gained from being a HundrED Youth Ambassador and a part of Global Innovation Field Trip (Innovation World | Invent Future Global) as well as her own experience with homeschooling and self-directed learning. Their group came up with “GEM ACADEMY,” which is a school that integrates core curriculum with self-directed learning and Finnish education, with an emphasis on teaching sustainable living.
Here is their mock website made in Canva which they used to pitch their ideas. Their group received a lot of positive feedback and whatever the results of the judging were, this homeschool mom’s heart is already brimming with pride witnessing how hard our child worked on this hackathon and especially in seeing this creative, innovative, and collaborative idea come into life.
All glory to God!
P.S. Thank you to Galit Zamler for letting Allyra join this Vickathon!
Learn more about hackathons here: https://youtu.be/zu9So85BxjY
