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Lakshmipriya L
software engineer
Blogger
- Sept. 27, 2025
Hatathon: Where Students Fought Like Engineers
Turning Labs into Live DevOps Arenas
What happens when a college lab transforms into a live DevOps arena?
In just 2 days, 60 Marian students:
- Built and deployed apps on OpenShift
- Automated CI/CD with Tekton pipelines
- Secured workloads with RBAC and secrets
- Solved real-time failures under pressure
The outcome:
- Industry-ready portfolios
- NAAC/NBA-compliant
- A new benchmark for Industry on Campus
Read the full case study: Marian’s Hatathon Story
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#Hatathon #DevOps #RedHatAcademy #IndustryOnCampus #NAAC #FutureReady #CloudNative #OpenShift #Automation
Turning Labs into Live DevOps Arenas: Marian’s Hatathon Story
Build. Battle. Breakthrough.
As part of IPSR’s Jubilee Year – Industry on Campus initiative, Marian College hosted a 2-day Hatathon that turned campus labs into a corporate-style arena powered by Red Hat Academy toolchains. Students worked in real roles, shipped working solutions, and the college left with OBE/NAAC/NBA-ready evidence.
Event Snapshot
| Organized By | ipsr solutions limited |
| Host Institution | Marian College Kuttikkanam (Autonomous) |
| Duration | 2 Days (15–16 Hours) |
| Participants | 60 students (12 teams of 5 members each) |
| Mentor | Szen John Providence |
| Tools Used | Red Hat OpenShift, Ansible Automation, Tekton CI/CD Pipelines, Kubernetes RBAC, Security & Troubleshooting Tools |
| Outcome | Industry-ready skill development with OBE & accreditation artefacts |
Why Hatathon Matters
As part of its Silver Jubilee Year celebrations, IPSR launched several initiatives aimed at empowering students, educators, and institutions to make education more industry-relevant and future-ready.
Hatathon is one of these initiatives, specifically designed to:
- Empower Students: Offer hands-on exposure to Red Hat technologies and modern DevOps practices.
- Support Colleges: Provide OBE-compliant documentation, rubrics, and CO-PO mapping to strengthen accreditation processes like NAAC and NBA.
- Bridge Academia and Industry: Simulate real corporate roles and workflows within the academic setting.
- Boost Employability: Equip students with portfolio-ready artefacts and certifications that enhance placement opportunities.
Event Structure
The Marian College Hatathon was structured as a real-world simulation, blending learning, innovation, and competition:
| Phase | Activities |
| Day 1 – Orientation & Preparation | Introduction to tools and platforms, role assignments, peer teaching, and guided practice sessions. |
| Day 2 (Morning) – Innovation Arena | Teams worked on real-world problem statements, creating deployable solutions under time-bound conditions. Random oral Q&A ensured active participation and accountability. |
| Day 2 (Afternoon) – Evaluation & Showcase | Teams presented their projects to faculty and IPSR mentors. Scoring was based on rubrics covering innovation, technical accuracy, problem-solving, and teamwork. |
| Awards & Recognition | Winners were honoured with special goodies and certificates during the closing ceremony. |
Role-Based Learning
Every student participated in a specialized industry role, ensuring a deep and practical understanding of DevOps and Cloud workflows:
- Developer: Builds and deploys apps using OpenShift.
- DevOps Engineer: Automates workflows with CI/CD pipelines (Tekton).
- Cloud Engineer: Manages scalability, quotas, and routing.
- Security Engineer: Implements RBAC, manages secrets, and ensures compliance.
- Troubleshooter: Diagnoses and resolves live system failures.
Peer-teaching was a key element, ensuring every participant understood all roles through collaborative learning.
Challenges & Deliverables
The event focused on five core challenge areas, covering the complete lifecycle of a cloud-native application:
| Role | Key Challenge | Deliverable |
| Developer | Deploy a working app using OpenShift S2I or oc new-build | Deployed app URL + YAML manifests |
| DevOps Engineer | Automate build-test-deploy with Tekton CI/CD | Pipeline YAML + run log + test evidence |
| Cloud Engineer | Configure HPA and quotas to enable scaling | Scaling YAMLs + screenshots + architecture diagram |
| Security Engineer | Secure workloads via RBAC and secrets management | Security configs + secrets + scan reports |
| Troubleshooter | Simulate and fix failures in real time | Troubleshooting logbook with errors, root cause, and resolution |
Winner Highlights
| Award | Winning Team | Team Members |
| Hatathon Champions | Podman Knights | Denil Joseph Sunu, Kiran Kuruvila, Dyvin Biju, Adhithyan V S, Mobin Varghese |
| Runner-Up | Neural Syndicate | Adhil Shajahan, Amal Thomas, Aby Joseph, Muhammad Raihan OA, Gouri Nandhan P V |
Event Outcomes
By the end of the two-day Hatathon, participants achieved tangible outcomes at both technical and institutional levels:
For Students
- Technical Proficiency:
- Building, deploying, and scaling cloud-native applications.
- Automating workflows using modern DevOps pipelines.
- Implementing robust security policies and troubleshooting failures.
- Soft Skills:
- Collaboration under deadlines.
- Problem-solving in high-pressure scenarios.
- Leadership and cross-functional teamwork.
“Hatathon was a genuinely valuable experience. Apart from developing an app, we learned to deploy it on OpenShift, handle higher traffic by scaling workloads, and manage resources efficiently with autoscaling; thanks to guidance from Szen Sir. It gave us practical exposure to containers and the deployment pipeline, not just classroom theory.” Marian College Student Experience
For Marian College
- Accreditation Support:
- CO-PO mapped artefacts ready for NAAC and NBA.
- Rubrics and documentation aligned with OBE practices.
- Pre- and post-event analysis reports for evidence-based quality improvement.
- Institutional Value:
- Strengthened alignment with industry practices.
- Enhanced placement readiness of graduating students.
- A showcase of innovation culture for stakeholders and accreditors.
Impact Analysis
A self-evaluation survey measured the learning gains achieved through the Hatathon.
Results demonstrated a transformative impact on both technical skills and soft skills:
| Metric | Improvement |
| Confidence in using Red Hat technologies | 90% increase |
| Team collaboration and communication skills | 85% improvement |
| Real-world problem-solving ability | 88% improvement |
| Perceived relevance to career readiness | 95% positive rating |
Visual Highlights & Video
- Action shots of team discussions and coding sessions.
- Award ceremony photos capturing the moment of celebration.
- Group photo of all participants and mentors. Photos
- Video can be included. Hatathon@Marian College
Bring Hatathon to Your Campus
Run Industry on Campus at your institution and leave with NAAC/NBA-ready evidence plus standout student portfolios.
Contact: sigin.george@ipsrsolutions.com | +91 90203 92530
More: ipsr.org/services/red-hat-academy