Datathon Season 2026 Build Session 1

Overview The first build session is about reaching your first evidence milestone: showing that you are solving a real problem and have a credible path to creating value with data. You can come in with an existing idea or no idea at all. If you already have a few problems or ideas you want to explore, even better. This is the session to pressure test the problem, identify who it matters to, understand what data you can use, and narrow your idea into something you can realistically build before Demo Day.

The Milestone By the end of the session, your team should be working toward evidence that: A real problem exists Someone has reason to care about solving it Relevant data is accessible or can realistically be created There is a credible path from that data to a useful solution The scope is focused enough to start building Your framing should begin taking shape in your GitHub repository so that someone outside your team can understand the problem you are solving, who it is for, and what you intend to build.

Come Ready to Sprint The build sessions are two hours, and we are treating them as focused working sprints. We will be jumping into the work almost immediately, so please arrive on time and be ready to be brought up to the 14th floor at 6:00 PM. Arriving late means losing valuable working time with your team and mentors. For this first session, you do not need to have started building beforehand. Having a few problems or ideas you are interested in exploring will help, but it is not required. For future build sessions, we strongly encourage you to make as much progress as possible between events.

What to Bring Bring the setup you are most comfortable building with. At minimum, bring: Your laptop and charger Any tools or development environment you already use A notebook if you like working through ideas on paper Whiteboards, markers, paper, and other basic working materials will be available during the session. For the first build session, you do not need to…