The First in Bulgaria Legal Hackathon for Students Was Held at the UNWE

The opening of the hackathon was attended by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Zahary Tormanov, Dean of the Law Faculty, Prof. Dr. Tsvetana Stoyanova, Vice-Rector for Institutional and Business Cooperation and Student Policies and Bilyana Gyaurova-Vegertseder, Director of BIPI /in the picture below from the left to the right/.

Within a weekend the students from secondary schools in Sofia had to create a game concept related to the judicial system. The type of game, computer, board or other kind depended entirely on their imagination.

The competition was opened by Bilyana Gyaurova-Vegertseder, Director of BIPI, who presented the activities of the Institute. "For the last 5-6 years our organization has started to work hard on the civil education because we have found it extremely important for a society to encourage young people in discussions about the rule of law and the functioning of the Bulgarian judiciary. We have made a number of educational films for students of different grades. It is the first legal hackathon under the title Gamify the judiciary and it has an objective to create a model of a game that is related to the judiciary", explained Mrs. Gyaurova.

Bilyana Gyaurova-Vegertseder

Prof. Dr. Tsvetana Stoyanova welcomed the participants by saying: "Our university was pleased to support the initiative of BIPI for organizing the first hackathon on legal topics in Bulgaria for students. I hope that the game you will develop today will help your peers to understand more easily the principle of the legal system. I am sure that I will see many of you in September because the UNWE and the Law Faculty could give you a lot. Believe in your abilities, pursue your dreams, know that they come true when you make some efforts".

Prof. Dr. Tsvetana Stoyanova

"You have a difficult task in this game - to combine the law which has a thousand-year-old tradition with the modern technologies dating back since the 1970s as well as to say the most important thing about the judiciary. The guiding function of law in a society is to resolve its conflicts with the necessary justice, ethics and morality", addressed to the students also the Dean of the Law Faculty Assoc. Prof. Dr. Zahary Tormanov.

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Zahary Tormanov

The participants in the hackathon were students from the National High School for Applied Arts “St. Luke“, 132 Secondary School "Vanya Voynova", Private High School “Prof. Nikolay Raynov”, 128 High School "Albert Einstein" and Second English Language High School "Thomas Jefferson" which were divided in 6 teams by the organizers.

During the second day of the hackathon each team presented its concept within 10 minutes. The jury composed of Prof. Dr. Zahary Tormanov /Dean of the UNWE Law Faculty/, the Director of BIPI Bilyana Gyaurova-Vegertseder, Dr. Zhenya Lazarova, psychologist and neuro-scientist, creator of the educational games and judge Vladimir Valkov, was delighted with the performance of the six teams.

The jury with the participants in the competition

The ranking is as follows:

• The first place was won by the team of Konstantin Simeonov /Second English Language High School "Thomas Jefferson"/, Paola Stefanova /Second English Language High School "Thomas Jefferson"/ and Elizaveta Shevchenko /National High School for Applied Arts “St. Luke“/. They developed the idea for the only board game at the competition - The Apple of Discord;
• The second place was occupied by the team of Lilia Belyashka, Elitsa Todorova and Stanimira Dimitrova /Second English Language High School "Thomas Jefferson"/ - Judge IT;
• The third place was taken by the team of Matvey Ohrimenko, Natalia Meradzhova and Emma Sergieva /128 High School "Albert Einstein"/ - Guilty or not Guilty.

The awards were bestowed by the Ambassador of the Kingdom of Netherlands in Bulgaria H. E. Simon van der Burg.

The Ambassador of the Kingdom of Netherlands to Bulgaria H.E. Simon van der Burg is awarding the team ranked at the first place

In conclusion, the BIPI Director Bilyana Gyaurova-Vegertseder outlined: "Although the topic is unpopular and at first glance too complex to synthesize into a game, the participants exceeded our expectations in terms of creativity and depth of insight into the topic. We are immensely proud of all the participants and hope they will continue to develop their innovative flair. We are grateful to the UNWE for embracing this challenge providing their facilities and resources to the students".