From Campus to Community: CodeOn 2025 – Building Resilience and Connection Through Tech 🚀

Hi everyone! 👋 I’m David Contreras Palacios, a GitHub Campus Expert🚩from Peru, and I recently had the incredible opportunity to co-organize CodeOn 2025 at Universidad Tecnológica del Perú. It was an unforgettable journey filled with learning, challenges, and the magic of collaboration between passionate communities.

You can follow future updates and highlights about the event on the Developer Student Clubs UTP. 🚀

🎯 About the Event

CodeOn 2025 brought together over 120 attendees students, professionals, and tech enthusiasts all eager to learn, share, and grow through technology.

We kicked off with Gian Sandoval (GitHub), who showcased a smart tourism app built with Flutter. Using Gemini and Google Maps, he demonstrated how travelers can create personalized itineraries based on time, date, and location all in one seamless experience. 🌍📱

Then, joining us from Santiago de Chile, Nicolás Lecaros Marchant (Bio), Data Architect and Google Developer Expert, introduced Gemini and BigQuery, explaining how data architecture impacts performance and how batch processing prevents system overloads. He also unveiled Code Gemini Assist, a tool that turns data into powerful visual insights. 📊☁️

Next, Damián Siré (GitHub) brought unmatched energy to the stage with a live coding session no slides, just pure code. He demonstrated how multithreading in browsers can drastically boost performance, making even complex interfaces smoother and faster. ⚙️💻

Representing Arequipa, Valentina Milagros Chambilla Perca (GitHub), a Systems and Electrical Engineering student, shared her inspiring journey building MVP prototypes with Flutter, integrating Firebase and IoT to create smart devices like a water consumption monitoring sensor innovation at its best. 💧🔌

Finally, I had the pleasure of leading a hands-on workshop on GitHub and MCP (Model Context Protocol), exploring how AI can streamline project workflows and automate repetitive tasks. I also shared my journey with GitHub Certifications and best practices for collaboration and version control. 🧠💬

We wrapped up with a fun Q&A session and giveaways that left everyone feeling motivated and ready to keep building. 🎁🙌 Among the prizes were adorable Mona plushies and a Mona figurine, which quickly became attendee favorites. We also gave out Copilot pins to the first participants who arrived at the event, during the final raffle, and to some amazing volunteers who helped distribute the GitHub Education materials, including the GitHub Cheat Sheet. It was a great way to celebrate everyone’s enthusiasm and teamwork! 🐙✨

🧩 Behind the Scenes: Planning and Execution

Organizing CodeOn 2025 was a real lesson in resilience. We learned that even the best plans can change overnight but with teamwork, clear communication, and trust, everything can fall into place.

All logistics were handled on time: event banner, volunteer kits, and post-event meals were funded through the GitHub Education Sponsorship, prioritizing the CodeOn volunteers.
We prepared 50 volunteer kits, filled with snacks. The swag giveaway became a highlight attendees loved the Copilot pins and GitHub-themed materials! 💙

💬 Impact and Feedback

The feedback from participants was overwhelmingly positive and truly inspiring. 💯 Every attendee said they would recommend the event to others, with most rating it 10/10 and highlighting the sessions on Git, MCP, and GitHub Copilot as their favorites.

Many students emphasized the clarity and practicality of the talks, saying things like:

“All the knowledge about GitHub Copilot and how to use it. Excellent presentation, everything was easy to understand.”

Others appreciated the technical depth and energy of the sessions:

“A lot of knowledge about GitHub, solving errors, using the Copilot extension, and learning about student benefits like certificates. Everything was great, very dynamic.”

Several attendees shared how transformative the experience was:

“I had never heard of GitHub before, and now I see how powerful it is. The best part was learning about the GitHub Student Pack. 10/10.”

Others expressed enthusiasm for future events:

“The Student Pack was great. It was such a good workshop; I hope there are more like this.”

We also shared the GitHub Student Developer Pack, and students eagerly signed up to explore its benefits from accessing official GitHub and MongoDB certifications to unlocking GitHub Pro. Many expressed interest in using it to improve their workflows, experiment with Copilot for Students, and continue learning through automation and open-source collaboration. 🚀

🌐 Community Collaboration

CodeOn 2025 wouldn’t have been possible without our incredible partners:

• DSC UTP
• Lead UPN
• GDG Open Lima

Their support with logistics, promotion, and volunteers was key to bringing this event to life.
In total, we reached nearly 900 registrations, showing the growing passion for developer education and open source in Peru. ✨

💭 Reflections and Lessons Learned

CodeOn reminded me that no matter how well we plan, unexpected events can change everything.
Just days before the event, a march was announced near our venue in Lima, putting everything at risk. We didn’t want to expose attendees or speakers to unsafe conditions, so we decided to split the event into two days.

Originally planned as a one-day event, we had to split it into two separate dates due to the national protests announced three days before the event.
To ensure everyone’s safety, the first session (October 25) featured international speakers already in Lima, while the second session (November 15) will include the remaining national speakers.

Fortunately, all logistics were managed on time banner, event materials, volunteer kit, and post-event meals were purchased the same day using sponsor funds, prioritizing the DSC UTP members.
We had prepared 50 volunteer kits in advance, all packed and ready before the event. Since only part of the volunteer team attended the first session, a limited number of kits were distributed, while the remaining ones are safely stored for the second date.

The swag was a huge success attendees loved the stickers, cheat sheets, and GitHub-themed goodies. During the first session, I organized a giveaway of all Copilot pins, as I won’t be able to attend the second date due to another scheduled event. The remaining materials were left with the team to be distributed during the second day.

Some expenses such as the coffee break and additional materials were intentionally postponed for the second session to optimize resources.
We are also requesting to extend the sponsorship period until November 15 in order to fully execute the second day as originally planned.

This experience taught me that success isn’t about having a perfect plan, but about how you respond when plans fall apart.
Staying calm, communicating clearly, and prioritizing safety and collaboration are what truly matter.

If I could offer one piece of advice to other Campus Experts, it would be:

Plan for flexibility. Always have backup plans, and never compromise safety for the schedule.

Because events like CodeOn aren’t just about tech talks or swag they’re about creating spaces where students feel connected, supported, and inspired to grow as developers and as a community. 🌱💻

🗣️ Let’s Talk

Have you ever had to change your event plans at the last minute?
How did your team adapt? Or if you’re planning your first community event, what’s one thing you’d like to be prepared for?

I’d love to hear your stories and insights after all, resilience isn’t built alone, it’s built together. 💪🌍

📸 Event Photos