SASEhack

SASEhack 2026

Hybrid STEM Connect 2026 Hackathon

Sept 18-20 (Online) | Oct 1-2 (Seattle)

registration closes 09.15.26 · 11:59 PM PT
open to students at U.S. colleges & universities · 18+

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17Mins

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// about

You Don't Need to Know How to Code

SASEhack is open to undergraduate and graduate students enrolled at U.S. colleges and universities — any major, any nationality, including international students studying in the U.S. About half the people who show up have never been to a hackathon before. There are workshops all weekend, office hours and help channels on Discord when you get stuck, and plenty of ways to contribute besides writing code.

260+Hackers

46Universities

48%First-Timers

24Projects Built

// timeline

One Hackathon. Two Competitions.

Everyone builds online, and every submission gets judged. A group of top teams is then invited to pitch in person in Seattle — but you don't need to make that round to win.

ONLINE COMPETITION

Online Build

Sept 18-20 · Discord & Zoom

Kickoff is Friday at 6 PM PT and submissions close Sunday at 11:59 PM PT. Sponsor workshops and mini-activities run through the weekend, and mentors are on Discord the whole time. Nobody has to travel for this part.

IN-PERSON COMPETITION

Live Pitches

Oct 1 · Seattle, WA

Invited teams pitch at the STEM Connect convention on Oct 1, and winners are announced Oct 2. At least one member of a presenting team needs their own convention ticket — we can't cover travel.

// prizes

Build For Impact. ~$3,700 In Prizes.

Cash for the overall winners, a prize on every track, a pot for the live pitch competition in Seattle, and one set aside for teams doing this for the first time. Every submission competes for the overall prizes.

$1,000Grand Prizecash · overall

$750Runner Upcash · overall

$500SASEhack Pitch Competition+ special merch for every invited finalist

$200Best First Hackmostly-first-timer teams

// five tracks · ~$250 each

Tick the tracks you want on the Devpost submission form — you can enter up to two. Spirit of Charge Up is automatic and doesn't use up a pick.

Best Hardware Hack

Build something physical. Sensors, microcontrollers, robotics, wearables. A phone sensor or a cheap board counts.

~$250

Best Design Hack

For projects where the design does the heavy lifting. Craft counts more than technical depth here.

~$250

Best Education, Accessibility, or Social Impact

For projects serving people who are badly served by what already exists. Name who you built it for.

~$250

Best Finance Hack

Anything to do with money. It doesn't have to be bank grade, just make a financial decision easier or clearer.

~$250

Spirit of Charge Up

Carries this year’s STEM Connect theme. Build something that gives a person or a community a boost.

~$250 No entry needed

Prizes go to the team, not to individuals. Cash is split evenly among team members — a prize won by a team of four is divided four ways. Physical prizes are duplicated so everyone on the team gets one.

// testimonials

Straight From Our Hackers

A few notes from people who did this last year.

“I had a lot of fun participating in SASEhack. Collaborating and building an innovative and impactful project was incredibly enjoyable.”
Sandra L.

“Shying away from traditional hackathons and their barriers to entry, I managed to find success in SASEhack as the virtual accessibility and opportunity for in person pitching helped me plan and set aside time to create and refine my project with teammates.”
Alan T.

“Shying away from traditional hackathons and their barriers to entry, I managed to find success in SASEhack as the virtual accessibility and opportunity for in person pitching helped me plan and set aside time to create and refine my project with teammates.”
Alan T.

“The annual SASE hackathon was my first hackathon and a great introduction to how hackathons worked, the kinds of projects that could be done, and the types of workshops and engagement events that could be hosted. I was able to experiment in a welcoming environment surrounded by encouraging students and instructors”
Sarayu V.

// past_projects

Built at SASEhack

The eight winners from Fall 2025. Click any card for the full Devpost write-up.

GRAND PRIZE

GeneGuard

Translate raw genomics into plain-English, family-shareable health insights powered by network biology.

BEST FIRST-HACKATHON HACK

PrepSTAR

Mock behavioral interviews based on the STAR method — rates your performance and coaches your answers.

BEST NON-AI HACK

CappuConnect

Discover events, see who's attending, and schedule coffee chats — grow your network effortlessly.

BEST PITCH TRACK WINNER

Hopscotch

Jumping from one milestone to the next.

BEST FRONT-END DESIGN

BroadCast

Replaces one-sided parasocial marketing with genuine local connections so small creators can turn their craft into a side hustle.

BEST HARDWARE HACK

Envirolytics

An IoT device and dashboard helping you build a healthier home.

TRACK WINNER

KeyRoute

A smart keychain that buzzes and flashes on live MBTA data — making transit easier for deaf riders, seniors, and newcomers.

TRACK WINNER

Tapestry

Foresee your many futures using personal alternate realities.

View All 24 Projects

// hacker_guide

Start With the Hacker Guide

Schedule, rules, submission checklist, prizes, FAQ. We keep updating it as details firm up, so don't bother memorizing anything — just check back.

View Hacker Guide

// sponsors

Sponsor SASEhack 2026

Hundreds of STEM students spend two weekends with us, online and in Seattle. Sponsors run workshops, put up prizes, mentor teams, and recruit. Email us and we'll put together something that fits what you're after.

Reach Out

Speakers

Kalpana Nagalingam

Ford Motor Company

Dottie Li

Rebecca Okamoto

Christine Lee

I partner with high-capacity leaders to cut through the noise, reclaim focus, and elevate their performance – without burnout or compromise. My clients include executives at Google, Northrop Grumman, Collins RTX, US Bank, the NFL, Daimler Truck, and Sompo Intl. – high achievers who demand clarity, systems, and results.

Over the past 16 years, I’ve coached and advised across industries and disciplines, helping clients consistently achieve outcomes beyond what they thought was possible. My coaching approach is grounded in the belief that we must know ourselves to lead ourselves, and that transformational leadership is often personal before it becomes professional.

I earned my early stripes on Wall Street, where high-stakes execution was non-negotiable. Later, I transitioned into higher education and career counseling, helping clients navigate major inflection points, transitions and the gap between achievement and meaning, which gave me a deep understanding of the psychology behind sustainable growth, not just successful results.

And in building a high-performance piano studio, I developed a system of taking students from zero to elite performers under deadline and onstage. My core system included a repeatable framework for deliberate practice, resilience, and results under pressure. I invested in long-term, high-trust partnerships that helped my clients push past resistance, master complexity, and perform well – until their performance became an extension of who they simply were.

That same trust-based structure now fuels my coaching work with executives navigating professional environments. I help them align their identity and performance, and develop into being the kind of leaders others want to follow. The Five Voices framework blends strategic challenge with deeply personalized support, unlocking clarity, confidence, and real behavioral change in how we communicate and lead others.

Christine Lee has a B.A. in International Relations from Wellesley College and M.Ed. in Counseling from UCLA. She is a certified coach with GiANT Worldwide.

Leonna Luc

Yon Na

Leo Cheung

Jeff Lovell

Aaron Lee

Hope Yin

Nozomi Morgan

Sarita Vasa

Lawrence Huey

Historic Agenda from STEM Connect 25

Executive

Thu..
Fri..

09:45

P7.1 - Breaking Your Ceiling: Unlocking Meta Performance for Executive Impact

Breaking Your Ceiling: Unlocking Meta Performance for Executive Impact (Part 1 of 2)

Time: 9:45 AM - 12:15 PM

Room: 3B

Speaker/Trainer: Lawrence Huey, Amy Tucker

Target Audience / Career Band: Executive

Session Format: Interactive workshop with strategic reflection, peer dialogue, and practical planning

SASE Leadership Competency Focus: Strategic Planning (LO.1.1), Self-awareness (LY.1.5), and Accountability (LP.3.5)

Session Overview

Note: This is the first part for certification. Participants who attend the full session series and submit the completed worksheet will receive a certificate of participation recognizing awareness of the Executive competencies covered.

At the executive level, the next breakthrough rarely comes from working harder. It comes from seeing the system more clearly, evolving the leadership patterns that shaped past success, and aligning decisions with the future the organization needs to create.

For STEM executives, past success can become an invisible ceiling. The habits, assumptions, and decision-making approaches that helped leaders advance may not be the same ones required to lead through complexity, influence across systems, and drive enterprise-level results. Sustained executive impact requires the ability to step back, examine how leadership choices shape strategy and culture, and create stronger accountability for translating vision into measurable progress.

This session introduces meta performance as an executive leadership capability: the ability to intentionally examine how you think, decide, influence, learn, and create value. Through strategic reflection, peer dialogue, and practical planning, participants will identify the leadership ceilings that may be limiting their next level of impact and clarify the shifts needed to lead with greater strategic focus, self-awareness, and accountability.

Executives will leave with a sharper understanding of where their leadership must evolve, how to strengthen alignment around key priorities, and what actions will create greater enterprise value over the next 30–60 days.

Leadership Competencies Strengthened

At the Executive career band, these competencies are about more than personal improvement or day-to-day execution. They involve seeing how individual leadership patterns shape enterprise strategy, organizational culture, stakeholder alignment, and measurable business outcomes:

- Strategic Planning (LO.1.1) - Clarifying where leadership must evolve to support long-term organizational priorities and enterprise-level results.

- Self-awareness (LY.1.5) - Examining the habits, success patterns, and assumptions that may be creating a ceiling on future executive impact.

- Accountability (LP.3.5) - Identifying actions that create stronger ownership, follow-through, and enterprise value around strategic priorities.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this interactive workshop, participants will be able to:

- Identify the success patterns, assumptions, and leadership habits that may be creating a ceiling on future executive impact.

- Apply a strategic planning lens to clarify where their leadership must evolve to support long-term organizational priorities.

- Examine how their leadership style and decision-making patterns influence enterprise alignment, culture, and performance.

- Identify opportunities to strengthen accountability by clarifying ownership, expectations, and follow-through around strategic priorities.

- Use peer dialogue and reflective practice to surface new perspectives on current leadership challenges and growth opportunities.

- Develop a focused executive action plan that connects self-awareness, strategic direction, and accountability to measurable enterprise impact.

Participant Takeaways

Participants will leave with a clearer understanding of the leadership patterns that may be limiting their next level of executive impact and a focused 30–60 day action plan for strengthening strategic focus, self-awareness, accountability, and enterprise value.

14:15

P7.2 - Breaking Your Ceiling: Unlocking Meta Performance for Executive Impact (continued)

Breaking Your Ceiling: Unlocking Meta Performance for Executive Impact (Part 2 of 2)

Time: 9:45 AM - 12:15 PM

Room: 3B

Speaker/Trainer: Lawrence Huey, Amy Tucker

Target Audience / Career Band: Executive

Session Format: Interactive workshop with strategic reflection, peer dialogue, and practical planning

SASE Leadership Competency Focus: Strategic Planning (LO.1.1), Self-awareness (LY.1.5), and Accountability (LP.3.5)

Session Overview

Note: This is the last part for certification. Participants who attend the full session series and submit the completed worksheet will receive a certificate of participation recognizing awareness of the Executive competencies covered.

Leadership Competencies Strengthened

- Strategic Planning (LO.1.1) - Clarifying where leadership must evolve to support long-term organizational priorities and enterprise-level results.

- Self-awareness (LY.1.5) - Examining the habits, success patterns, and assumptions that may be creating a ceiling on future executive impact.

- Accountability (LP.3.5) - Identifying actions that create stronger ownership, follow-through, and enterprise value around strategic priorities.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this interactive workshop, participants will be able to:

- Identify the success patterns, assumptions, and leadership habits that may be creating a ceiling on future executive impact.

- Apply a strategic planning lens to clarify where their leadership must evolve to support long-term organizational priorities.

- Examine how their leadership style and decision-making patterns influence enterprise alignment, culture, and performance.

- Identify opportunities to strengthen accountability by clarifying ownership, expectations, and follow-through around strategic priorities.

- Use peer dialogue and reflective practice to surface new perspectives on current leadership challenges and growth opportunities.

- Develop a focused executive action plan that connects self-awareness, strategic direction, and accountability to measurable enterprise impact.

Participant Takeaways

09:30

P7.3 - Executive Round Table

Beyond AI Adoption: Reimagining What’s Possible for Leadership, Teams, and Organizations

Time: 9:30 AM - 12:00 PM

Room: 3B

Speaker/Trainer: Nozomi Morgan, Keith Nishida

Target Audience / Career Band: Executive

Session Format: Executive Roundtable with Wisdom Circles and peer dialogue

SASE Leadership Competency Focus: Navigating Uncertainty (LO.3.3), Strategic Planning (LO.1.1), and Change Management (LP.3.8)

Session Overview

AI is creating more than new efficiencies. It is giving executive leaders an opportunity to fundamentally rethink how organizations are designed, how teams work, how decisions are made, and what high performance looks like.

This Executive Roundtable moves beyond AI tools and adoption to explore a more strategic question: What becomes possible when we rethink leadership, teams, and organizations through an AI-native lens? An AI-native leader is not simply someone who uses AI effectively, but someone who recognizes that AI is changing what is possible and is willing to challenge long-held assumptions about how work gets done, where value is created, and how organizations operate.

Through facilitated Wisdom Circles and peer dialogue, executives will exchange perspectives, surface emerging practices, and learn from one another. Together, participants will explore how leadership needs to evolve in an AI-enabled world, how people and AI can each contribute where they create the greatest value, which assumptions AI gives leaders permission to rethink, what should be intentionally preserved as organizations evolve, and what will distinguish truly high-performing organizations when access to AI becomes ubiquitous.

This session is designed as a strategic space for senior leaders to step back from implementation, think with peers, challenge assumptions, and expand what they believe is possible for the future of their organizations.

Leadership Competencies Strengthened

At the Executive career band, these competencies involve guiding the entire organization through complexity, interpreting major industry shifts, defining long-term direction, making high-level decisions, and leading large-scale transformation with clarity and confidence:

- Navigating Uncertainty (LO.3.3) - Guiding organizations through complexity and industry shifts while maintaining agility and resilience.

- Strategic Planning (LO.1.1) - Connecting emerging technology shifts to long-term organizational vision, enterprise-level decisions, and future value creation.

- Change Management (LP.3.8) - Leading people and organizations through AI-driven transformation while building clarity, trust, commitment, and resilience.

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this Executive Roundtable, participants will be able to:

- Identify long-held assumptions about leadership, work design, team structures, decision-making, or value creation that may need to be reexamined in an AI-enabled future.

- Describe how AI may shift where value is created across people, teams, systems, and organizations.

- Explore how executive leaders can connect emerging technology shifts to long-term organizational vision, strategic priorities, and enterprise-level decisions.

- Examine how leaders can guide people and organizations through AI-driven transformation while building clarity, trust, commitment, and resilience.

- Reflect on what should be intentionally preserved as organizations evolve, including human judgment, trust, culture, relationships, and purpose.

- Articulate one strategic question or leadership commitment they will take back to their organization to advance future-focused thinking about AI, leadership, teams, or organizational design.

Participant Takeaways

Participants will leave with a clearer understanding of how AI-native leadership can expand what is possible for their organizations and with one executive-level commitment to help guide strategic thinking, change leadership, or organizational transformation.

13:45

P7.4 - Master Executive Storytelling: How to Convince, Compel, and Shift Mindsets with Strategic Narratives

Master Executive Storytelling: How to Convince, Compel, and Shift Mindsets with Strategic Narratives

Time: 1:45 PM - 3:00 PM
Room: 3B

Speaker/Trainer: Rebecca Okamoto

Target Audience / Career Band: Executive

Session Format: Interactive workshop

SASE Leadership Competency Focus: Storytelling (LY.2.4) and Influencing Others (LP.2.5)

Session Overview

Storytelling has become a critical leadership capability for executives. Once viewed as a creative skill or a “nice-to-have” communication style, strategic storytelling is now essential for helping senior leaders align stakeholders, challenge conventional thinking, and shape business outcomes.

Executive storytelling is not simply about humanizing leadership or delivering a moving presentation. It is a strategic communication technique that helps leaders clarify complexity, connect ideas to business priorities, and guide others toward a shared conclusion. When used well, a strong narrative can align opposing views, shift mindsets, and create momentum around important decisions.

In this workshop, participants will learn how to create a strategic narrative that influences senior stakeholders and supports executive-level leadership. Participants will explore how to guide others to see from their perspective, draw meaningful conclusions, and move toward action. Using a practical framework, they will learn how to build a strategic storyline that can be delivered in as few as 10 slides or 10 sentences.

Leadership Competencies Strengthened

At the Executive career band, these competencies involve using strategic narratives to communicate direction, shape culture, align senior stakeholders, challenge conventional wisdom, and inspire action across the organization:

- Storytelling (LY.2.4) - Crafting narratives that move beyond information-sharing to create alignment, influence decisions, and advance business outcomes in complex environments.

- Influencing Others (LP.2.5) - Using strategic narratives to guide senior stakeholders, shift mindsets, and create momentum around critical business priorities.

Learning Objectives

By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

- Explain why strategic storytelling is an essential executive leadership capability, especially when leaders need to align stakeholders, shift mindsets, or create momentum around a business priority.

- Identify the mindset, assumption, or conventional wisdom that must shift in order to influence a senior stakeholder or leadership audience.

- Apply a practical storytelling framework to organize a strategic narrative in a clear, compelling, and concise way.

- Develop a strategic storyline that helps stakeholders understand the current context, see the business implications, and draw a shared conclusion.

- Practice shaping a narrative that connects audience perspective, business priorities, and desired action.

- Determine how to use strategic storytelling to influence decisions, build alignment, and support executive-level business outcomes.

Participant Takeaways

Participants will leave with a practical framework for building executive narratives and the beginning of a strategic storyline they can use to influence senior stakeholders, shift mindsets, and communicate with greater clarity and impact.