Hey friends 🌲
Matthew from Hack Club HQ here. This is the fifth edition of a semi-regular email update I send to club leaders. Check out the previous updates here. If you're receiving this email for the first time, welcome to the club 👁
Since my last update, I've spent the last 6 weeks talking to over a dozen of you about how I can improve your experience as club leaders, and using the feedback you shared with me to build something new. After hours of calls, intense coordination with all of you, and lots of writing, I'm beyond excited to announce Hack Club Meetings—now live at meetings.hackclub.com.
The largest barrier to getting a Hack Club off the ground is that running a coding club is really hard. Too many new Hack Club leaders ultimately fail because they can't figure out how to get past this barrier. Hack Club Workshops lower it tremendously—but translating a workshop to a great club meeting presents its own major challenge. I ran a terrible club for nearly 2 years before I felt like I figured it out. Many of you have similar stories. When I think back to what would have helped me during my first year as a club leader, one thing immediately comes to mind: being able to see for myself what a good club meeting looks like.
In each Hack Club Meeting, you'll find:
- A full recording of a real Hack Club meeting
- A detailed summary of the club meeting, including the activity/workshop, timestamps to highlight the best parts of the meeting, and what the leader did to make it happen
- Step-by-step instructions for how to run that exact meeting in your own Hack Club
- All resources used—slides, workshops, Spotify playlists, etc.
My hope for Meetings is that they will make your life as a club leader much easier. When you first start a Hack Club, you should feel confident that Hack Club HQ has you covered for your first few months as you build the skills to run a great club on your own. As you gain experience, you should always be able to discover new meetings that make your own club way better, and it should be incredibly easy to share your own best meetings with other club leaders.
Right now, I think Hack Club Meetings are about 50% there—but I want to get to 100%. So, my ask to you: can you run one of these three Meetings in your next club meeting? Then, let me know how it went. Over the next few weeks, I'll be adding new Hack Club Meetings and using your feedback to aggressively iterate on the format.
Thank you so much to Aiden, Lorenzo, Soham, Juan, Risha, Shoumik, Rachel, Adison, Byeongjun, Joe, Sam, Rishi, and Claire for getting on a call with me. The feedback each of you gave was incredible. And a special shoutout to Claire, Soham, Kai, Byeongjun, Jeewoo, and Aiden for recording one of your actual club meetings. I know that was a huge ask, and you're all the best.
I am so excited for this. This is what I wish I had when I was leading my Hack Club, and I can't wait to see how it helps you and your club. If you have any feedback, clarifying questions, or want to help get some more Hack Club Meetings online, please let me know. ❤️
That's all for now. See you soon 👋
-✨🚀👁 Matthew
BONUS CONTENT:
- ☀️ Here's the view from Hack Club HQ's front door in Shelburne, Vermont:
- 🎧 POP 2
- ❓Brontosaurus Blvd, Dinosaur, CO 81610
(P.S. I'm not using any fancy software to send this email—I literally just BCCed you in Gmail. If you don't want to keep receiving these emails, or you aren't running a club anymore, just reply and let me know.)