The international hackathon will be an online event for 150-200 people from 10-12 countries. The goal of the event is to create innovative solutions for climate-related local problems with the participation of teams formed by applicants. Target audience will be youth between 18-30 living in rural areas in the European Union (the event will be open, but project partners will also directly recruit participants with diverse interdisciplinary talents). The online hackathon begins with an Opening Ceremony to introduce challenges and guidelines, followed by a Development Phase where participants collaborate on solutions and mentor interactions. The event concludes with a Closing Ceremony featuring final presentations, judges' evaluations, and awards, all focused on fostering innovation for climate-related local problems. The winning team will be awarded a mentoring opportunity by their chosen project partner, which will host them, and provide further training and support to the realization of their climate-related community action.

We chose a hackathon as an event form because it is a creative, innovative, practice-oriented, and fun participation method that brings people together around a common cause, builds collaboration, and boosts co-creative peer learning. While hackathons originated in the IT sector, they are now widely used in other fields as a means of developing possible solutions to social, environmental, or intersectional issues. By focusing on real-life and relevant environmental issues, the project hackathon will deepen personal investment by the participants and provide tangible benefits to local communities. The hackathon will teach participants about problem-solving, ideation (idea generation) processes, project planning, testing, and presentation – skills that are essential to impactful participation and active citizenship.