how i went into debt building oregon state's hackathon

an upperclassman i looked up to once told me it's impossible to get students here to do shit. after a year of trying to revive a hackathon club that hadn't received funding in two years and lost nearly every previous officer, i fell into the same conclusion. it wasn't until my sophomore year, after attending some of the largest collegiate hackathons, that i decided to try anyway. one other officer of the club shared the vision that this was something worth putting our all into and so we set things into motion. two months before the date we picked, we had no venue, no funding, no sponsors, and three other people on our team. securing an overnight venue was first. it hadn't been done at our university. after weeks of relentless emails and meetings, we finally convinced the building manager to trust us. he told us later he'd ignored us at first. he didn't believe we were serious about pulling it off. and that became the pattern: people didn't take us seriously until it was easier for them to say yes than no. sponsors came next. through cold emails and personal connections, we landed companies that had no business working with a club that hadn't ever ran a serious event. enough to offer over $5,000 in prizes. lastly came funding. our school offers a $4,000 special events grant. we were either in the club finances inbox or their office every day. and the day before the hackathon, we finalized our grant. then we did the math. equipment costs $1,500. we wanted to add at least $1,000 to the prize pool. catering was $25 per person. so we could support 100 students. we hit 100 registrations and kept climbing. i looked at the other officer and knew we were thinking the same thing: no fucking way we're closing registrations. 300 registrations later, we ended up spending $4,000 on catering alone. the rest of the expenses, around $6,000, we paid out of pocket, knowing we couldn't get reimbursed until the following year. the result: over 250 students showed up. company representatives flew out to support it. we'd built something from nothing, and people actually came. here's what i learned: the conditions don't have to be right. credibility isn't given, it's earned by not going away. and when you have real skin in the game, when you're willing to bet on the thing you're building, the ceiling for what's possible changes completely. that senior was wrong. students here can be motivated. someone just has to do it first.