About the challenge

Missouri Hacks, organized by SOARE, offers high school students an opportunity to demonstrate their enthusiasm for computer science at Missouri's largest public university. Participants get to experience a hands-on workshop in their chosen category, and then collaborate in teams to create and present coding projects, competing against their peers. Their submissions are evaluated by a panel of upper-level computer science graduates and undergraduates for grading and placement. Participants who place high on the leaderboard are awarded prizes.

• Creativity
  How well did the participant do in coming up with a unique or unexpected idea? How well does the project fit our theme, or explore and expand upon the concept of Smart Cities?
• Functionality
  Does the project work as intended? How well does the demo run during the presentation? Are there any glaring bugs?
• User Experience
  How user-friendly is the project? Does it feel natural or have a clever way of interacting with the program?
• Learned Experiences
  Earned points for learning a new technology/skill or taking a currently known language to new heights. Teams should be clear in their presentations what they learned.
• Presentation
  How well does the team show off their work to the judges via the demo? Is the presentation of the project clear and easy to understand?
• Bonus
  Something unique or wildly out of the box the team did to make their project stand-out.