[vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_video src=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLVKqhpspUo&t=6s” margin_top=”10″ margin_bottom=”10″][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text]Welcome to the The Hurt Hub@Davidson’s new weekly vlog (video + blog), Hub Happenings! My name is Jessie, and I am going to take you along with me weekly as we explore the adventures of Davidson College’s new community of innovation and entrepreneurship on campus! Don’t forget to like this video, comment what you would like to see, and subscribe to our YouTube channel so that you never miss a Hub Happenings upload! Thanks for watching. We will see you next week :)[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]By Jessie Epstein ’21, Resident Vlogger at The Hurt Hub.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
The Jay Hurt Hub for Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Davidson College Launch Party
“What is the Jay Hurt Hub for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, aka The Hurt Hub@Davidson?” — a question all members of The Hurt Hub team are accustomed to answering.
The answer often depends on who asks: encompassing every detail of what The Hurt Hub offers students, let alone community members, donors and faculty. The question can pose an interesting challenge; however, the main message is clear.
This was best illustrated by The Hurt Hub’s Launch Party that took place on Thursday, September 6. The event started off in the front of the building as donors, community members, students and Davidson faculty and staff gathered to watch Jay Hurt ‘88 and Ed Van Daman ‘69, both alumni donors who made The Hurt Hub possible, cut the ribbon and officially open the The Hurt Hub. Each person who gathered that muggy Thursday brought their own idea of what the The Hurt Hub is to them, but perhaps learned a bit more as they walked around. As Davidson College President Carol Quillen spoke to the crowd she offered her own description: “an ecosystem of innovation and entrepreneurship.”
Many students and graduates have been involved with The Hurt Hub even before the Launch Party and Dedication. These students showcased their projects and ideas at the event. Graduate Leslie Alvarado ‘17, a computer science alumna currently working for Charlotte-based startup Tech Talent South, displayed her original project in The Hurt Hub’s Virtual Reality lab. Leslie created a virtual reality experience where students are able to understand what it would be like to have different colored skin. Leslie wishes that she had The Hurt Hub as a resource when she was at Davidson, saying that it would have been nice to work on her tech dream “somewhere other than Chambers basement at 3am.” This is the case for many of the students who showcased their projects during the Launch Party: they are ecstatic to have a place to pursue their ideas and work on new, creative ventures.
Of course, the space is not just for working on specific projects. For many students, the Launch Party was their first time inside The Hurt Hub. Each student had a unique answer about what they thought of the new building and what this new resource would offer them. Two Davidson College seniors, Lily and Jacob, offered their first impressions of the Hub. Like many of the other students at The Hurt Hub, Lily and Jacob were impressed with the pleasing aesthetic of the space. When asked what they would tell other students to get them excited about The Hurt Hub, they answered, “There’s coffee, uncolonized study space, and natural light!” What more could a Davidson student ask for?
For some students, The Hurt Hub is a great place to settle down with class notes, drink kombucha, and enjoy time away from the library. For others, this is the first real place dedicated to the development of their entrepreneurial and innovative dreams. As President Quillen said, The Hurt Hub is an ecosystem in which every student can be involved. The more students that come, the more diverse and complex this ecosystem will be.
By Lucy Fasano ’21, Resident Storyteller at The Hurt Hub.
On Saturday, September 8, The Hurt Hub was buzzing with the activity of 40+ students working on an open-ended challenge at the 2018 Davidson College Hackathon. Participants and volunteers arrived before 8:30AM for breakfast, orientation, and the unveiling of the challenge — to experience Davidson’s campus in a new way, focusing on historical, artistic, STEM, or other perspectives. Meeting rooms and work spaces all over The Hurt Hub filled with computers and coffee-chugging students and staff as they worked throughout the day to build websites and apps. Lucid Travel CEO and Flywheel Coworking member Ben Knosby treated the crowd to a great lunchtime talk, sharing nine secrets to success from his entrepreneurship journey.
Finally, at 4:30PM, the teams submitted their work and presented it to a celebrity panel of judges from campus: Kristen Eshleman – Director of Digital Innovation, Sherry Nelson – Director of Davidson Arts and Creative Engagement, and Fuji Lozada – Associate Dean of Faculty and Professor of Anthropology and Environmental Studies. Twelve teams completed the challenge and competed for the following awards (with trophies designed and produced by Brian Little in Davidson’s makerspace, Studio M):
Best Communication: Team Manatees (Bryan Ortiz ’21, Hannah Cha ’22 and Taylor McFadden ’22) built a website that allows students and prospective students to reach out to other students or faculty, helping prospective students who cannot make a campus visit to Davidson feel like they have been here and connected with people.
Best Coding: Team Nineball (India Little ’19, Sarah Eisenach ’19, Elizabeth Sasser ’19 and Jose Balcazar ’19 (not pictured)) built a Davidson College-only dating web app, with the goal to encourage and enable more meaningful relationships among students on campus.
Best Overall: Team FICSIT (Marianna Ghirardelli ’21, Natalie Kucher ’19, Eleni Tsitinidi ’21 and Sarah Hancock ’21) highlighted women in STEM with a web site including a trivia quiz, a tool to match a student with a faculty mentor in a STEM field, and stories about women in STEM at Davidson.
Hackathons are known for their focus on learning new things, friendly competition, and fun. Davidson’s local version at The Hurt Hub was a big success in all these ways and more, by bringing the community together and giving back many innovative ideas and projects, several of which have already been adopted for further development and production.
When Davidson’s computer science major was approved in late 2016, the first few students to declare the new major were women — and women have been a proactive and leading force in the program ever since. Recognizing that technology can be an isolating experience, whether in school or at work, several women in the computer science program formed a women’s coding club called FICSIT in 2015-16. Their mission is to provide a safe and comfortable space for female programmers/computer scientists to foster out-of-classroom learning experiences and to encourage creativity and exploration in the computer science community. FICSIT stands for Females In Computer Science and Information Technology, pronounced “fix it.” Get it?
FICSIT meets every other week. Their activities have included collaborative lessons in HTML and CSS, attending (and winning!) hackathons, discussing computer science classes and research opportunities, visiting the VR lab and Studio M (the campus makerspace), and interacting with technology professionals in person and online. Co-presidents Megan Goodling and Kendall Thomas are planning a focus on career exploration in 2018-19. They invite all Hurt Hub members, supporters and partners to suggest potential speakers and activities by contacting their advisor Laurie Heyer. Email laheyer@davidson.edu, or stop by and see her at The Hurt Hub!
News of Davidson is a nonprofit website for news and information about Davidson and its environs for the people who live and work here — and those who wish they did.
You will find tips and thoughts from our columnists, see some news items, and discover the Distinguished Davidsonians feature. The columns, Random Acts of Kindness and Voices of Davidson, are tailored for contributions from our citizens about happenings in their own lives.
We hope that readers will visit often to find news, sports highlights, topical columns from community neighbors, information from nonprofit agencies, and an integrated calendar of key community events and dates.
Please submit your articles for these columns or events for our community calendar to editors@newsofdavidson.org.
We offer an easy option to sign up for our email notifications on our main page. We typically send out two emails a week, to avoid email clutter. One email is a summary of the articles we have posted over the previous week, the second email is called “Ready, Set, Weekend in Davidson.” It is a quick summary of events taking place in Davidson.
We are especially happy to be founding members of the Hurt Hub@Davidson. We look upon this great place as an incubator of ideas and stories that should appear on our site! Please get in touch with us so that we can tell the community about your special projects and business ideas.
We also are eager to hear your thoughts about our site. Send your ideas to contact@newsofdavidson.org.
News of Davidson Board of Directors: David Batty, Jane Campbell, Stephanie Glaser, Catherine Hamilton-Genson, Ruby Houston, Cindy Jones, Meg Kimmel, Bill Giduz, Pat Stinson, Connie Wessner, and Marguerite Williams
News of Davidson Editorial Board: Jane Campbell (Sports), Bill Giduz (News), Meg Kimmel (Co-Editor), Marguerite Williams (Co-Editor)
By Jessie Epstein ’21, Resident Vlogger at The Hurt Hub.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
