Designing Situated Computing Experiences for Girls: Intersectionality, CTScale, and HCI Artifacts in Hackathon 360

Tainá G. Souza; Elaine F. Rangel Seixas; Marcelo Rocha; Anna Beatriz Marques; Estéfani N. P. Eller; Sandy F. Cabral; Isabel Reis G. Lacerda; Aline de Paula Nascimento; Débora C. Muchaluat-Saade; Luciana Cardoso de Castro Salgado

doi:10.5753/jis.2026.7538

Authors

Tainá G. Souza Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8311-5043
Elaine F. Rangel Seixas Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0009-0001-8713-222X
Marcelo Rocha Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9624-3784
Anna Beatriz Marques Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9214-3399
Estéfani N. P. Eller Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0009-0008-7766-1807
Sandy F. Cabral Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0009-0001-5873-1506
Isabel Reis G. Lacerda Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0009-0009-8250-0538
Aline de Paula Nascimento Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0009-0006-8341-113X
Débora C. Muchaluat-Saade Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0009-0006-8341-113X
Luciana Cardoso de Castro Salgado Fluminense Federal University https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1207-6021

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5753/jis.2026.7538

Keywords:

Computing Education, Social Robotics, Hackathon, Intersectionality, Computational Thinking, HCI

Abstract

Girls from socially vulnerable contexts often face educational and symbolic barriers that restrict their access to Computing. This study examines how Hackathon 360 constitutes a situated formative Computing experience for these girls, extending the investigation conducted in its First Edition by broadening both the empirical basis and analytical scope. The research adopted a comparative mixed-methods design involving distinct cohorts from the 2024 and 2025 editions, both organized as multi-day formative processes, with a short-term longitudinal analysis conducted in the Second Edition. To address the research objective, the analysis articulated evidence from questionnaires, CTScale data collected before each Hackathon, the intersectional characterization of participants, the pedagogical redesign, and HCI artifacts. The findings indicate that the experiential categories identified in the First Edition also recurred in the Second Edition, characterizing the Hackathon as meaningful, collaborative, and socially relevant. The intersectional analysis situated this experience within racial and socioeconomic inequalities, restricted access to computing devices, and limited prior technical experience. Participant feedback informed pedagogical adaptations that expanded hands-on programming opportunities, while the CTScale characterized the Computational Thinking dispositions. The HCI artifacts showed how identities, experiences, and educational and psychosocial barriers were translated into personas, scenarios, interaction flows, and prototypes. Taken together, these findings characterize Hackathon 360 as a collaborative and situated formative Computing experience grounded in access, participation, pedagogical responsiveness, representation, and technical authorship.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Allaire-Duquette, G., Chastenay, P., Bouffard, T., Bélanger, S. A., Hernandez, O., Mahhou, M. A., Giroux, P., McMullin, S., and Desjarlais, E. (2022). Gender differences in self-efficacy for programming narrowed after a 2-h science museum workshop. Canadian Journal of Science, Mathematics and Technology Education, 22(1):87–100. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42330-022-00193-7.

Altermatt, B. (2007). Reliability analysis. [link], Accessed on 20 August 2026.

Amaral, M. and Oliveira, L. (2024). Como abordamos a interseccionalidade na computação? busca por valores interseccionais em uma revisão sistemática de literatura na base sol. In Anais do XVIII Women in Information Technology, pages 183–194, Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil. SBC. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/wit.2024.2605.

Ashcraft, C., Eger, E. K., and Scott, K. A. (2017). Becoming technosocial change agents: Intersectionality and culturally responsive pedagogies as vital resources for increasing girls' participation in computing. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 48(3):233–251. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/aeq.12197.

Benavent, X., de Ves, E., Forte, A., Botella-Mascarell, C., López-Iñesta, E., Rueda, S., Roger, S., Perez, J., Portalés, C., Dura, E., Garcia-Costa, D., and Marzal, P. (2020). Girls4STEM: Gender diversity in STEM for a sustainable future. Sustainability, 12(15):1–17. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/su12156051.

Brasil (2018). Base nacional comum curricular: Educação é a base. [link], Accessed on 20 August 2026.

Brasil (2022). BNCC Computação – Complemento. [link], Accessed on 20 August 2026.

Briscoe, G. (2014). Digital innovation: The hackathon phenomenon. [link], Accessed on 20 August 2026.

Brown, T. (2008). Design thinking. Harvard Business Review, 86(6):84–92. [link], Accessed on 20 August 2026.

Cooper, A. (2004). The Inmates Are Running the Asylum: Why High-Tech Products Drive Us Crazy and How to Restore the Sanity. Pearson Higher Education, 2 edition.

Cowan, K. (2013). Hack the barbican: A playground of arts, technology and entrepreneurship. [link], Accessed on 20 August 2026.

Crenshaw, K. W. (2015). Why intersectionality can't wait. [link], Accessed on 20 Aug 2026.

Desidério, S. B., Lelis, M. R. L., Rodrigues, M. E., and Marques, A. B. (2024). How ready for hci? a qualitative analysis of the practice of soft skills related to hci by women involved in the digital girls program partners projects. Journal on Interactive Systems, 15(1):504–516. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/jis.2024.3852.

Doleck, T., Bazelais, P., Lemay, D. J., Saxena, A., and Basnet, R. B. (2017). Algorithmic thinking, cooperativity, creativity, critical thinking, and problem solving: Exploring the relationship between computational thinking skills and academic performance. Journal of Computers in Education, 4(4):355–369. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40692-017-0090-9.

Ferreira, S., Álekiss Mélo, Oliveira, A., and Andrade, W. (2023). Processo de tradução de instrumento diagnóstico de pensamento computacional para graduandos. In Anais do XXXIV Simpósio Brasileiro de Informática na Educação, pages 58–68, Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil. SBC. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/sbie.2023.234441.

Kolb, D. A. (1984). Experiential Learning: Experience as the Source of Learning and Development. Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.

Korkmaz, Ö. and Bai, X. (2019). Adapting computational thinking scale (cts) for chinese high school students and their thinking scale skills level. Participatory Educational Research, 6(1):10–26. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17275/per.19.2.6.1.

Korkmaz, Ö., Çakir, R., and Özden, M. Y. (2017). A validity and reliability study of the computational thinking scales (cts). Computers in Human Behavior, 72:558–569. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2017.01.005.

Kos, B. A. (2019). Understanding female-focused hackathon participants' collaboration styles and event goals. In Proceedings of the International Conference on Game Jams, Hackathons and Game Creation Events 2019, pages 1–4. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3316287.3316292.

Kovaleva, Y., Happonen, A., and Mbogho, A. (2022). Towards gender balance in modern hackathons: Literature-based approaches for female inclusiveness. In Proceedings of the 2022 IEEE/ACM 3rd International Workshop on Gender Equality, Diversity and Inclusion in Software Engineering (GEICSE), pages 37–44. IEEE. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3524501.3527594.

Marques, A. B., Salgado, L., Moro, M., and Araújo, A. (2026). Intersectional gender dynamics in junior scientific research in computing: Race, income, and territorial dimensions among brazilian girls. In Anais do VI Simpósio Brasileiro de Educação em Computação (EduComp), pages 138–152. Sociedade Brasileira de Computação (SBC). DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/educomp.2026.18227.

Menezes, M., Genesio, N., Castro, A., Silva, J., Silva, L., Campos, J., and Valle, P. (2025). Como ensinar lógica de programação por meio do desenvolvimento de jogos digitais? In Anais do V Simpósio Brasileiro de Educação em Computação, pages 479–490, Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil. SBC. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/educomp.2025.5352.

Moreira Oliveira, C. and Pereira, R. (2023). Pense computacionalmente: Uma abordagem para apoiar o exercício do pensamento computacional.

Nielsen, J. (1994). Usability Engineering. Morgan Kaufmann, San Francisco.

Nielsen, L. (2013). Personas-user focused design, volume 15. Springer.

Oliveira, L. C. d., Amaral, M. A., Bim, S. A., Valença, G., Almeida, L. D. A., Salgado, L. C. d. C., Gasparini, I., and Silva, C. B. R. d. (2024). Grandihc-br 2025–2035 - gc3: Plurality and decoloniality in HCI. In Proceedings of the XXIII Brazilian Symposium on Human Factors in Computing Systems (IHC 2024), pages 1–19, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3702038.3702056.

Porter, L., Bailey Lee, C., Simon, B., Cutts, Q., and Zingaro, D. (2016). A multi-institutional study of peer instruction in introductory computing courses. ACM Transactions on Computing Education, 16(4):358–363. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/2938142.

Preece, J., Rogers, Y., Sharp, H., Benyon, D., Holland, S., and Carey, T. (1994). Human-Computer Interaction: Concepts and Design. Addison-Wesley.

Prince, M. (2004). Does active learning work? a review of the research. Journal of engineering education, 93(3):223–231. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/j.2168-9830.2004.tb00809.x.

Programa Meninas Digitais (2025). RENACEE_MD – Rede Nacional de Educação e Extensão Meninas Digitais. [link], Accessed on 20 August 2026.

Rankin, Y. A. and Thomas, J. O. (2020). The intersectional experiences of black women in computing. In Proceedings of the 51st ACM technical symposium on computer science education, pages 199–205. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3328778.3366873.

Rocha, M. M. d., Favela, J., and Muchaluat-Saade, D. C. (2025). Design and evaluation of an xml-based language for programming socially assistive robots. International Journal of Social Robotics, pages 1–29. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12369-025-01254-1.

Rodrigues, K., Duarte, R. S., do Nascimento, Á. L. F. F., and César, R. L. V. (2025). Interseccionalidade e tecnologia: Um mapeamento sistemático de publicações em português sobre gênero, raça e classe na participação feminina. In Women in Information Technology (WIT), pages 24–34. SBC. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/wit.2025.8067.

Rogers, Y., Sharp, H., and Preece, J. (2013). Design de Interação: Além da Interação Humano-Computador. Bookman, Porto Alegre.

Rosson, M. B. and Carroll, J. M. (2002). Usability Engineering: Scenario-Based Development of Human-Computer Interaction. Morgan Kaufmann, San Francisco, CA.

Sociedade Brasileira de Computação (2025). Grandes Desafios da Educação em Computação no Brasil 2025–2035. Sociedade Brasileira de Computação, Porto Alegre.

Souza, T., Flores, M., Monteiro, N., Eller, E., Cabral, S., Lima, A., Nascimento, A., Muchaluat-Saade, D., and Salgado, L. (2025). Hackathon 360: Estimulando meninas na computação em projetos de robótica social para educação. In Anais do XIX Women in Information Technology, pages 139–150, Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil. SBC. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/wit.2025.8584.

Sweller, J. (1988). Cognitive load during problem solving: effects on learning. Cognitive Science, 12(2):257–285. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1207/s15516709cog1202_4.

Szlavi, A., Hansen, M. F., Husnes, S. H., and Conte, T. U. (2023). Intersectionality in computer science: A systematic literature review. In 2023 IEEE/ACM 4th Workshop on Gender Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in Software Engineering (GEICSE), pages 9–16. IEEE. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1109/GEICSE59319.2023.00006.

Tisha, S. N., Sakib, M. N., and Dey, S. (2026). Competing or collaborating? the role of hackathon formats in shaping team dynamics and project choices. In Proceedings of the 57th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 1, pages 1061–1067. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3770762.3772660.

Universidade Federal Fluminense (UFF), Pró-Reitoria de Extensão (2016). include meninas.uff. [link], Accessed on 20 August 2026.

Valença, G. and Santos, R. (2022). Como organizar hackathons inclusivas? In Simpósio Brasileiro sobre Fatores Humanos em Sistemas Computacionais (IHC), pages 1–2. SBC. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/ihc_estendido.2022.226574.

Zurn, P., Bassett, D. S., and Rust, N. C. (2020). The citation diversity statement: a practice of transparency, a way of life. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 24(9):669–672. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2020.06.009.