48 Hours, 200+ Builders, and the Thing Schools Forgot How to Do: A SheBuilds Hackathon Reflection
It has only been a few days since the SheBuilds Hackathon results were released, and I have spent this week sitting with that experience - turning it over, examining it from every angle, and letting it land. These are my four key takeaways.
I built something I am genuinely, deeply proud of.
And I mean that without qualification. Going in, I had no roadmap and no guarantee - just a concept and 48 hours to see what I could make of it. I embraced every unknown, and what came out on the other side is layered, nuanced, thoughtful, and intentional. The judges saw it too. Their feedback on pace and flow wasn't just validating - it was useful. It gave me something to refine. Without the pressure and the container that SheBuilds provided, COMPASS would still be an idea living in a notebook. Now it's a product with a future.
The culture inside that hackathon was something I have never witnessed before.
Two hundred women builders showed up - and not one of them played small or played dirty. What emerged almost immediately was a creative ecosystem built on intentional inclusion: people connecting across builds, lifting each other's ideas, celebrating wins that weren't their own. We all came to compete. We all left knowing we had won something bigger by being there together. I was heads-down for most of those 48 hours, but every time I surfaced - every voice chat moment, every scroll through Discord - I felt it. That energy was real. And it was extraordinary.
As a lifelong educator, it also broke my heart a little.
Because the experience I had inside that hackathon? The permission to explore, to take real risks, to innovate without apology? Schools should feel like that. They rarely do. We have built systems that, despite the best intentions of the people inside them, routinely strip educators and students of the time, the resources, and the structural freedom to actually experiment. Innovation isn't celebrated - it's tolerated in small pockets, when someone fights hard enough to make space for it. I have spent twenty years in those trenches. I know how hard that fight is.
And now I want to do something about it - differently.
Being outside the daily grind gives me a vantage point I didn't have before. I can see the systemic patterns more clearly. I have the tools, the frameworks, and honestly - the grit - to help principals and school leaders architect their way out of some of these sticking points. I am actively looking to connect with colleagues who are ready to name the friction, unpack it, and build toward something better.
That frustration you just felt reading this? That's exactly why I built the Architect's Circle.
It is a monthly membership designed specifically for school leaders who are done waiting for the system to create the space - and are ready to build it themselves. Every month, you get a new Google Sheets tool built around real operational problems, access to a growing vault of frameworks and resources, and a seat at the table with a community of leaders who are thinking the same way you are. No fluff. No filler. Just the grit-to-polish work that actually moves the needle.