Hacking 4 Defense (H4D) – Spring 2027
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Hacking 4 Defense (H4D) is a mission-driven, real-world problem-solving course where student teams work directly with the Department of War (DoW), military units, and national security organizations to address operational, technical, and human-centered challenges.
HOW THE COURSE WORKS ?
Hacking for Defense uses the same teaching methodology proven successful in Lean LaunchPad
and I-Corps classes taught at universities across the country.
The difference in this class is that instead of teams working on their own ideas for a company, they
address critical problems facing the Department of War and the Intelligence Community.
The problems students work to solve are submitted from problems submitted by various DoW
sponsoring organizations.
DURING THE COURSE
- Each week the student teams interview at least 10 beneficiaries-military/government end users and stakeholders—to deeply understand the sponsoring organization's problems and to develop a set of initial hypotheses about the solution to their problem.
- Returning to class, the teams give a weekly 8-minute presentation about what they learned and demo their latest minimal viable prototypes.
- Teams get feedback from the instructors, mentors and the classmates.
- Each team documents the details of their beneficiary discovery interviews on their blog.
- This enables teams, instructors and mentors to have immediate access to the progress of each team.
"The Nation's Brightest Minds, Tackling The Toughest Problems
"
850 Problems Addressed
3,750+ Participating Students
66 Participating Universities
62 Startups Formed
Learn about the national Hacking for Defense® program at the H4D website .