Yes! You do not have to have a big team or extensive attendee list. Sometimes event sites might not even come up with hacking projects. On those occasions, you might provide the attendees with tutorials, or you can watch simultaneously presented tutorials from other event sites and run brainstorming sessions to discuss the implementability of the presented methods in your research.
One thing to remember is that regardless of your event’s size, you always need a good supporting team working alongside the main organizers. Because, as you can read from the How to Guideline for Running Successful Brainhack, there are several aspects you have to consider and plan ahead of the event, and each requires a dedicated team of volunteers to work synchronously.
We are not able to provide each local Brainhack site with a personalized website for their event, but event holders will receive a general template that can be easily personalized with their event’s information. Here you can find the template provided by the Brainhack Global. If you have any difficulties adapting the template, you can contact us through our email at brainhackorg [at] gmail [dot] com, and we will do our best to help you.
Likewise, we won’t be able to oversee the presentation broadcasting at each local Brainhack site individually, but we will provide you with general information on how to set up the necessary infrastructure in our guidelines listed in our Github repository
Once you declare your interest in running an event by sending an email to brainhackorg [at] gmail [dot] com, our Brainhack Global team will contact you with several questions about the planned event and confirm your participation to that year’s Brainhack Global. We will also provide you the links and information regarding the:
Once you confirm that you will host an event, the Brainhack Global team will give you the support you need (i.e., as much as our volunteer team is able to provide). It is recommended to keep the Brainhack Global team up to date with your plans and preparations to swiftly get the support you need.
As an event organizer, you have the responsibility to ensure the good conduct of your event as well as the safety of your attendees. First of all, as the main organizers, you have to make sure that you, all the volunteers working together with you and all of your attendees read the Code of Conduct and are clear on the terms declared in it.
You are highly recommended to have a dedicated Code of Conduct Committee whose members are outside of the organizing and volunteering team and if possible it should be constituted by the legal consultants in handling the misconduct cases provided by your institute.
You have to make sure that your website clearly refers to the Brainhack Code of Conduct and you have a simple and clear reporting workflow that would make it easier for attendees to share their experiences and observations regarding the incident. The reporting workflow could be either via a dedicated email address, contact form, face-to-face meeting, written letter/template report, dedicated communication channels to contact the responsible team, or the personnel.
Please make it clear on your website that, you will handle the cases privately and with a respect, and act accordingly to any reported cases with the same care and delicacy independent from the magnitude of the cases and following the law/rules of the current state/country.
When a conduct concern under Brainhack Code of Conduct is raised to the Code of Conduct Committee, they should determine whether the situation can (and should) be defused by communicating privately and separately with the individuals most directly involved and, possibly, particular witness(es) (“simple resolution”).
In the existence of the microaggression, a simpler resolution might be provided with a warning and clear conduct instructions to a person accused of a violation of this policy. Following that the Committee should observe whether it is apparent that: the misbehavior is corrected and not repeated, a sense of safety and inclusion has been restored without the need for further action, and each side of the incident is satisfied and agreed with the resolution. The Code of Conduct committee will report the event organizers accordingly regarding the measures that are taken in place.
In the case of such resolutions are not adequate, the committee must conduct a comprehensive investigation. The committee should approach to the known individuals who are involved with the case personally and in private as first and provide an opportunity to provide any evidence, facts behind the incident. The notes/reports should be taken and shared across the parties to give an opportunity to respond in the accusations/descriptions of the incident. The Code of Conduct committee should set submission deadlines in their sole discretion but taking into account the nature of the conduct concern, timing, and logistics. The Code of Conduct committee should work on making a fair determination and any consequences imposed in as timely a matter as possible accordingly with the rules and laws of the associated organization/institute/country and state.
First of all, please make sure that you read, understand, and abide by the policies listed in the Brainhack Code of Conduct. Acting accordingly with the rules listed in the Code of Conduct is one of the main responsibilities of every single participant of the event.
Any action that violates the Code of Conduct should be immediately reported by following the procedures defined in the website of the local organization you are registered with. Depending on the event location/institute/state/country you are registered with the reporting procedures and resolving the violation of the Code of Conduct might differ from each other which defined and protected by the law of that current country/state where your local event is based on.
If the misconduct was held by one of the members of the local organizing committee, or if you feel that the local organization’s response to the case is inadequate, you are welcome to contact the Brainhack Global organizing team via sending us an inquiry via brainhackorg [at] gmail [dot] com providing
Your contact information, if you are comfortable providing it. Names (real, nicknames, or pseudonyms) of any individuals involved. If there are additional witnesses, please include them as well. Your account of what occurred, and if you believe the incident is ongoing. If there is a publicly available record (e.g. a mailing list archive), please include a link. Any additional information that may be helpful.
Please do not forget that the Brainhack Global Code of Conduct Committee team members is ready to support you with the available solutions. Reporting offensive behavior will not only stop it from happening to you, but it will also prevent it from happening to others, and it will help to for sustaining an open, diverse, and safe community. The Brainhack Global team has your back!
Every attendee is entitled to pitch a project. It might be either a project they are already working on or a project they would like to receive contribution/opinion/help or a completely new project they would like to accomplish with group work.
It is always recommended to propose a project that would allow contributions from researchers with a wider background and career level and give equal opportunities to anyone who involves. Please read our How to Guideline for Leading and Attending to Brainhack Projects for further recommendations and suggestions regarding leading a Brainhack project.
This year we offer a centralized project submission and listing experience independent of the event location you are registered with. With this we aim to create a platform to increase the across site interactions and provide means for collaborative and open science.
The project submission is expected to run through filling a template issue listed in in Brainhack Github, in which you will be asked to fill several details that describe your project, the goals you aim with this project and the profile of the attendees you are looking for. These clear descriptions will help event attendees to browse easily and find the best fit for themselves while increasing the visibility of your project.
For more information regarding how to submit your project issue and how the following review procedure works please read through our Brainhack Global 2020 Project Submission Guideline
When you propose a project make sure that it has a rough plan about the amount of work that needs to be done and that it has clear goals that can be (partly) achieved during the (short) amount of time you are provided with. Afterward, further collaboration is encouraged to finalize the project. If your project involves coding make sure that your codes, README documents, and materials are stored on an open-access reposition; hence the attendees who would like to join your project can quickly go over them and start helping/contributing as soon as possible.
We would recommend you to submit your project as early as possible alongside your registration to the event. This will help the attendees to benefit from the matching algorithm to find and apply to the project and attract more interest from the community. It will also help the local event organizers to arrange the schedule and time allocation of the project pitches and hack tracks accordingly.
Since you won’t have any knowledge about the expertise profile of the other Brainhack attendees until the hackathon starts, it is better to incorporate some flexibility into your project plan and schedule. Because there is always a possibility of getting help from any number of attendees on many different aspects of your project that you didn’t plan ahead. Please do not undermine the contribution that would come from any of the attendees at the event. This is one of the important parts of the event. Be inclusive and open to the contributions. Especially be open to the early career researchers who are there to learn from you; please do not forget that once you were one of them too. Providing people with an environment to learn and improve themselves is one of the main goals and gains of the event. And again you would never be able to know which contribution an attendee could provide you with. Therefore, it is always better to keep yourself open to different ideas and contributions and to let the brainstorming help you achieve your project’s goals.
Depending on the Brainhack local event site, you might be asked to give a short presentation of your project (usually on the first day of the event) to inform attendees about the project aim(s) and the tasks to be done. Please using the template provided in the Brainhack Github Repository prepare a short and clear presentation in accordance with the plan of the event site of your choice. Gather your team, and let the magic happen!
We recommend and support the use and application of open science tools and methodologies. Using open science tools will bring transparency in proceedings, foster the efficacious implementation of methods, and increases the audibility and reproducibility of the proceedings.
However, you might already have ongoing projects that use non-open science/source tools due to the specs or requirements of the project. This platform could also provide you with the opportunity to seek advice on how to implement those projects using open science tools. Any project for the good of the community, facilitating other’s research by making it reproducible and open is welcomed.