Uni’ Hackathon cracks problems faced by police
THE University of Sunderland has hosted its first ever Hackathon alongside Durham Police and Microsoft.
The competition sees six teams use technology to address and create solutions for the day-to-day problems that the police face.
There are a range of issues that the competition covered, such as keeping track of information for investigations and helping officers promote inclusivity while on duty.
A panel of judges from the University, Microsoft and Durham Police had to pick a winner after students spent two days developing and presenting their solutions.
Namandeep Khokhar, who studies BSc Computer Science and was part of the winning team, said: “Meeting such lovely members from different companies was such a pleasure and on top of that was an honour to work for them.
“Our team came out with a mobile application solution specifically related to assets that officers own in the field. In the app, an officer can easily login to it and can fill in the details or can capture images of their assets.
“I learned two things from this two-day Hackathon. One of them was that if a person really decided to get something, he or she can easily get that.
“Another was never say no to a new opportunity.”
Students had the opportunity to work with experts from ANS and learn new skills to help them to become the next generation of computing innovators.
Paul Graham, interim associate head of computing at the University of Sunderland, added: “This is the first time this has been done with a local university with an employer such as the police and these are skills that will help students become employable.
“These extra-curricular activities are an added benefit of coming to the University of Sunderland which we organise each term, and not only do students gain a degree, but they are also able to gain extra qualifications.”
Paul Guy, director of ICT at Durham Constabulary, also said: “Policing needs to be engaging with the technologists of the future who are emerging from academia, as these are the leaders and innovators of tomorrow – the hackathon was an ideal way to achieve this.”