Five University of Kansas students participating as the Rock Chalk 1 team walked away with top honors in the first-ever Code-A-Thon hosted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.

Teammates Andrew Tribble, Alex Warrington and Zach Welk at the KU Edwards campus and Justin Roderman and Alex Shadley at the Lawrence campus placed first for their voter registration and activation app called ElectionIQ. The app allows users to become registered voters, helps them locate their polling place and provides a preview of an election ballot.

All five students are pursuing degrees in tech-related fields.

The competition was organized by the Bank’s TechEdge program, which recruits students interested in computer science. In all, 29 students from the University of Kansas, Kansas State University and Missouri University Science and Technology participated. Code-A-Thon participants were given 48 hours to build an application around an innovation for a cause theme.

Kansas City Fed technology employees judged the submissions on innovativeness, user experience, functionality, impact/potential and presentation.

The Code-A-Thon is part of the Kansas City Fed’s university outreach program, which is designed to expose students and graduates to the organization’s technology careers.

“Technology is no longer a nice to have, it’s interwoven in the DNA of business,” said Brian Faros, chief information officer and vice president application delivery services for the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. “Working to cultivate new talent and inspire young people to choose careers in science and technology is just as vital to the future of nearly every industry.”