Polkadot India IIT Roorkee Workshops and Hackathon (1/5)
TL;DR
This is the first edition of a series aiming to build a developer community in India for the Polkadot ecosystem from the ground up by hosting in-campus workshops and hackathons in the leading IIT universities, which are known worldwide for producing the largest number of leading developers. IITs have a vast untapped talent pool that needs to be curated through a well-defined path of learning, knowledge exchange, and a competition. We are looking to establish the path through this 3-in-1 event, which features workshops for accelerated learning, the foundation of students' collective for a series of tech & non-tech activities, and the final hackathon.
Why not events bounty?
We did apply for the events bounty twice, but the curators denied our initial and refined proposals because of reasons mentioned, like a limit on the number of organizing members involved, their misunderstanding of the review rating with a star rating for one of the cheapest accommodations, etc. We will post a detailed thread on our experience with the events bounty, especially the curators’ lack of thorough research later as our priority is the successful hosting of this 3-in-1 event in one of the best universities for which getting another approval (letter of intent) won’t be easy.
Due to the two-week delay caused by the events bounty, we are forced to post multiple big tippers, as a small spender could take significant time. We need about 15k USD out of our total requested amount to make the necessary reservations/bookings (partial token amount wherever possible). So we are looking to post four big tippers and one small spender for the same. Upon approval of the first big tipper, we will encode the rest of the proposals and proceed with the bookings.
Overview
We are excited to propose a first-of-its-kind hackathon and workshop for the Polkadot ecosystem in India, organized by Blockseblock in collaboration with Edgetributors SubDAO. This event aims to foster innovation, development, and community engagement within the Polkadot ecosystem by bringing together talented developers, students, and blockchain enthusiasts. The fundamental propositions of this event are as follows:
- Hybrid structure: We will host the workshop and the hackathon two weeks apart, giving students time to review all the materials and the learning curve. Throughout this two-week period, we will guide/assist them virtually by forming a students’ collective.
- Importance of IITs: IITs are often referred to as talent hubs in India due to their challenging entrance barrier for students and for well-known student activities like fests, workshops, hackathons, etc. Hosting this hybrid event in an IIT will attract enthusiastic students from the nearby universities as well.
- Blockseblock's prior hackathon hosting experience, along with the technical curation/expertise of Edgetributors SubDAO contributors, will ensure that the event is not only successful but also impactful.
- Being the first of this kind of collaboration, we focus on keeping this event budget-friendly yet accessible for everyone. We will implement our learnings in future hackathons across different IITs.
Problem:
Limited Developer Awareness: There's a significant lack of awareness about PolkadotSDK and Substrate within the Indian developer community.
Ineffective Meetups: Standard meetups often fail to capture the attention of developers from India's crowded IT sector.
Tech Exposure Gaps: For Indian engineering students, significant-tech exposure typically occurs only within their universities or nearby IITs.
Campus Placement Culture: The prevalent campus placement culture in India means students often only explore opportunities with companies that visit their campuses, missing out on the vast opportunities offered by Web3.
Lagging Behind Competitors: The Polkadot ecosystem lags behind competitors in hosting student-specific learning events like workshops in the Indian demographic.
Solutions:
Hackathon at a Leading IIT: Organize a high-impact hackathon at a top IIT to attract and engage talented developers.
Pre-Hackathon Workshops: Conduct workshops before the hackathon to build foundational knowledge and excitement around PolkadotSDK/Substrate.
Formation of a Students' Collective: Establish a students' collective to foster continuous engagement, collaboration, and learning within the Polkadot ecosystem. This will be crucial to the team formation and other activities after hosting the workshops, before the start of the hackathon.
What's success?
- We expect 100-150 participants for the Workshops and Hackathon with at least 20-30 quality project submissions.
- Formation of the collective that can feature the Polkadot Ecosystem in the IIT Roorkee, acting as a self-sustainable incubator/space for the new age developers.
- This hybrid event aims at enhancing the visibility of the Polkadot ecosystem from the foundational level by cultivating more developers which will contribute to the natural growth and demand.
Event Details:
Venue: IIT Roorkee
IIT Roorkee, one of India’s premier engineering institutions, offers an inspiring and technologically advanced environment. Known for its rich history and commitment to excellence in education and research, IIT Roorkee is the perfect venue to host a hackathon aimed at driving innovation in the blockchain space.
Letter Of Intent:
Timeline
The workshops will be scheduled for September 26th and 27th, providing participants ample time and resources to prepare for the hackathon. The hackathon will commence on October 11th and conclude on October 13th.
1. Pre-Hackathon in-campus offline Workshops (26th Sep - 27th Sep):
- Introduction to Polkadot: Introducing Polkadot’s history, architecture, key features, and ecosystem.
- Technical Deep Dives: Workshops on building with Substrate/Polkadot-SDK, ink!, XCM’s cross-chain interoperability, and parachains/solochains.
- Hackathon Preparation: Guidance on hackathon best practices, tools, and resources available for participants.
2. Activities for the students’ collective (28th Sep - 10th Oct):
- Online bingobaker activity for different tech/non-tech tasks. Example:https://bingobaker.com/#348aadca50983be008b1962d485154f3
- Team formation activity
- NFT drops for students asking questions (Exclusive swag can be redeemed using those NFTs during hackathon period.)
3. Physical Hackathon Kick-off (11th Oct - 13th Oct):
- Mentorship and Support:
- Dedicated Mentors: Experienced mentors from the community and industry experts available for guidance.
- Technical Support Desk: On-site help desks to assist with technical issues.
- Resource Library: Access to documentation, APIs, SDKs, and other relevant resources.
- Project Development:
- Work Sessions: Participants work on their projects, with periodic check-ins from mentors.
- Regular Stand-ups: Brief updates from teams to track progress and address any roadblocks.
4. Judging and Awards:
- Submission on BlockseBlock: Submit projects, including code repositories, decks, and demo videos.
- Evaluation Criteria: Projects will be judged based on innovation, technical complexity, impact, feasibility, and presentation.
- Demo: Teams will present their projects to the judges and audience, followed by Q&A sessions.
- Prize distribution:
- First 3 projects; 1500, 1000, 500 USD equivalent in DOT
- Best pallet: 500 USD equivalent in DOT
- Best ink! contract: 500 USD equivalent in DOT
- Shared pool for valid submissions from teams participating in all the activities hosted for the students’ collective: 1000 USD equivalent in DOT
5. Post-Hackathon Activities:
- Mentorship Continuation: Offering support and mentorship for winning teams to help them refine and develop their projects further.
- Incubation and Acceleration: Extending opportunities for standout projects to join incubation or acceleration programs within the Polkadot ecosystem. We will provide them with a dedicated letter of recommendation.
TEAM:
About Blockseblock
BlockseBlock is a global hackathon hosting platform with a strong developer community in SE Asia. We are already a global hackathon platform for ICP blockchain. With our unique approach of providing personalized support to developers, we are helping thousands of builders start their projects in the web3 and blockchain domains. Some of the key stats of the platform:
- 100,000+ developers
- 600+ university partners
- 100+ hackathons
Snippet from the Previous Hackathon hosted by Blockseblock:
About Edgetributors SubDAO
Edgetributor SubDAO is a collective of currently active solo contributors from the Edgeware DAO, one of the oldest substrate projects from the Polkadot ecosystem. Edgetributor SubDAO is also the maintainer of the recently treasury-funded Universal Substrate Faucet project. The Edgetributors SubDAO members’ bring 3-4 years of Polkadot/Substrate ecosystem experience and expertise from different domains.
The members of Edgetributor SubDAO and their roles in this event hosting are as follows:
- Shankar Warang (Presenter, Operations, Bookings)
- C. Gagan Babu (Curation, Social media, Treasurer)
- Pranav C Pawar (Workshop host, Mentor)
- Raj Raorane (Workshop host, Mentor)
- Rama Vats (Workshop host, Mentor)
- Ashutosh Sahu (Community, Researcher, Activities host)
Edgetributors SubDAO’s Role
In this collaboration, Edgetributors will provide their expertise in substrate/PolkadotSDK and ink! development. Our contributions include:
- Development Expertise: Providing deep technical knowledge and guidance in Substrate/PolkadotSDK.
- Tech Talks and Workshops: Organizing and delivering workshops and technical sessions to educate and inspire participants.
- On-Ground Mentoring: Offering hands-on mentoring sessions throughout the hackathon to assist participants in overcoming technical challenges.
- Proposal Curation and Operations: Manage the curation of Polkadot proposals and oversee related operations.
- Involvement with Polkadot Blockchain Academy Graduates: Inviting graduates from the Polkadot Blockchain Academy as mentors and judges, ensuring high-quality guidance and evaluation.
- Infographics and social media: Creation of infographics for online/offline activities and awareness creation on social media channels
- Establishment and activities for Students’ collective: Setup the foundation framework and guidelines for the students’ collective, host tech/non-tech/hybrid activities to keep students engaged in the 2-week learning period between the workshops and the hackathon.
Benefits to the Polkadot Ecosystem
This hackathon will provide numerous benefits to the Polkadot community, including:
- Innovation: Encouraging the development of new and innovative solutions in the Polkadot Ecosystem.
- Community Engagement: Strengthening the Polkadot community by connecting developers, students, and blockchain enthusiasts.
- Education: Enhancing knowledge and skills related to blockchain technology, Substrate/PolkadotSDK through expert-led workshops and mentoring.
- Visibility: IIT Roorkee being the top 5 Engineering college by ranking in India, it’s an ideal hub to host such a hackathon as it will attract students from other major universities as well. Increasing the visibility of the Polkadot ecosystem within the Indian technology landscape, potentially attracting new developers and contributors.
Financials
Proposer: Blockseblock & Edgetributor SubDAO
Multisig address: 14XNJmoUzkvmh9cYoqG4axBRR4BWzWRbnFP79oiZgKu7V9bz
Required amount: 29978.18 USD
Amount including 10% refundable liquidation buffer: 32975.998 USD
EMA7: 4.466 USD/DOT
Total: 7383.78 DOT
Requested amount in the first tipper: 1000 DOT
Remainder amount for follow-up tippers/spender: 6383.78 DOT
💰Budgets Breakdown → Polkadot India IIT Roorkee Workshops and Hackathon Budget Proposal
Conclusion
We’re excited about this collaborative hybrid 18 days of event and believe it will bring huge benefits to the Polkadot ecosystem. By fostering innovation, education, and community engagement, we aim to make a real impact. With the experience/expertise of Edgetributors and the organizational skills of Blockseblock, this event is set to be a standout moment for web3 development in India.
We look forward to the Polkadot community’s support in making this event a success.
Comments (7)
Comments (7)
Can we get a comment from the events bounty members to know more about the issues with this referendum?
It is good to see a LOI from the IIT, we hope to see more documents like this in the future.
Events Bounty would like to provide some clarification to the community since we were mentioned in this proposal. Yes, we received this proposal submission twice, and we decided to reject it on both occasions.
We provided specific feedback to the proposers to help them refine their proposal to better align with our funding criteria. For the first submission, our decision to reject the proposal was based on several key concerns, which we communicated to the proposers.
Here is a screenshot of our initial response outlining these concerns
- Breakdown of Funds: The initial proposal lacked a detailed and transparent breakdown of expenses, which is crucial for understanding how the funds would be allocated. The presented budget can be viewed here
- Team Budget: A significant portion of the budget (almost 50%) was allocated to team salaries and related expenses (Blockseblock team costs and Edgetributor SubDAO costs), which seemed high given the overall event budget. We needed a clearer explanation of how these funds would directly contribute to the event's success.
- Overall Budget: Feedback from community members from India, suggested that the overall budget was high. We recommended starting with a smaller-scale event to build familiarity with the process and demonstrate impact before moving on to larger events.
After our initial rejection, the proposal was resubmitted with a more detailed budget breakdown. However, despite this effort, the revised proposal still needed to address our previously raised key concerns. Here is an explanation of our feedback on the second submission with an added screenshot from our email response:
- Overall Budget: The budget remains too high, even after our suggestion to reduce costs. The proposed expenses still exceed what we consider reasonable for this event, which raised concerns about financial management and feasibility.
- Marketing Invoice: The marketing invoice submitted was outdated (from 2023) and lacked specifics on the value it would bring or the services included. There was also a lack of detail on which influencers were involved and the overall relevance of influencer marketing for this event.
- Accommodation Costs: The proposal included 4-star hotel for accommodation, which is not in line with the Events Bounty guidelines. On our public page is stated that we do not fund 4 / 5 stars hotels or luxury accommodation.
- Website and Legitimacy: The Blockseblock website showed low traction, making it difficult to assess its legitimacy and effectiveness as a promotional tool. Additionally, the website was initially non-functional, complicating our ability to review it properly. The budget also did not clearly outline what was covered in the Blocksblock hackathon package, adding further concerns. When checking Edgetributors' social media, we also didn’t see any significant following or traction.
- Team Size and Budget: A major concern remained around the team size and budget allocation. Nearly 50% of the total budget was still allocated to team expenses. The proposal indicated accommodating 26 team members, which we felt was excessive for the scope of the event. We believe the event could be executed effectively with a much smaller team, which raised questions about the necessity of such a large team and the team’s ability to deliver the event efficiently.
Also, the overall funding directed towards hackers appears low compared to the significant budget allocated to the team. For example, the Winners' Prize Pool for the "Best Pallet" track is only $500, which is quite minimal and does not adequately reflect the value of the contributions and efforts.
Taking all this into consideration, and noting that the team was not willing to adjust the proposal accordingly after we provided feedback twice, we have decided that we cannot move forward with this proposal. While we are strong supporters of initiatives aimed at promoting Polkadot and engaging students through hackathons, the proposal in its current form does not align with our guidelines and expectations.
Can we get a comment from the events bounty members to know more about the issues with this referendum?
It is good to see a LOI from the IIT, we hope to see more documents like this in the future.
Events Bounty would like to provide some clarification to the community since we were mentioned in this proposal. Yes, we received this proposal submission twice, and we decided to reject it on both occasions.
We provided specific feedback to the proposers to help them refine their proposal to better align with our funding criteria. For the first submission, our decision to reject the proposal was based on several key concerns, which we communicated to the proposers.
Here is a screenshot of our initial response outlining these concerns
After our initial rejection, the proposal was resubmitted with a more detailed budget breakdown. However, despite this effort, the revised proposal still needed to address our previously raised key concerns. Here is an explanation of our feedback on the second submission with an added screenshot from our email response:
Also, the overall funding directed towards hackers appears low compared to the significant budget allocated to the team. For example, the Winners' Prize Pool for the "Best Pallet" track is only $500, which is quite minimal and does not adequately reflect the value of the contributions and efforts.
Taking all this into consideration, and noting that the team was not willing to adjust the proposal accordingly after we provided feedback twice, we have decided that we cannot move forward with this proposal. While we are strong supporters of initiatives aimed at promoting Polkadot and engaging students through hackathons, the proposal in its current form does not align with our guidelines and expectations.