Above: Janet Peters, Corporate Secretary iGovTT; Kirk Henry, iGovTT CEO; Esther Le Gendre, iGovTT Chairman; Professor Brian Copeland, Pro-Vice Chancellor and Campus Principal; Dr Fasil Muddeen, Head Department Electrical and Computer Engineering, UWI and Debra Coryat-Patton, General Attorney-at-Law at the signing of the MOU. Photo courtesy iGovTT.

The National Information and Communication Technology Company Limited (branded iGovTT) and the University of the West Indies, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) yesterday, to host iGovTT’s first Hackathon. iGovTT focuses on government Information and Communication Technology (ICT) projects that support the movement toward e-Government and Trinidad and Tobago’s overall ICT development.

The partnership with the University illustrates the company’s belief that investment in the nation’s youth, can assist in building a knowledge-based economy.

The Hackathon will gather brilliant minds from tertiary institutions across Trinidad and Tobago, to channel creative energy through hours of innovating, designing and coding. Participants will be challenged to leverage technologies to develop solutions aimed at addressing ICT challenges and needs within the Government.

The hackathon will take place from March to September 2019 and has attracted 22 teams with a maximum of five students each. Six teams will then be shortlisted to continue development of the ICT solutions with the winner being selected in September. Professor Brian Copeland, Pro-Vice Chancellor and Campus Principal of UWI’s St. Augustine Campus, said that the hackathon will allow participants to gain practical experience in project management, analysis, documentation and comprehensive testing at Government institutions.

He noted that the University is looking forward to working with iGovTT, to afford tertiary level students with a valuable opportunity to develop and implement real-life technological solutions that can impact Trinidad and Tobago.

“Hackathons are a popular new forum for team collaboration and new-age creativity applied to software development,” said Esther Le Gendre, Chairman, iGovTT. “Our goal for the Hackathon is to challenge highly talented students to ‘think outside of the box’ and equip them with the knowledge while providing them with the experience from analysis to implementation of solutions.”