Qiskit Fall Fest 2026at Purdue University
QSO home
Hosted by the Quantum Student Organization at PurdueJoin us for Qiskit Fall Fest at Purdue: a weekend of lectures, workshops, an open house, and a team hackathon using Qiskit.
Scroll downPurdue students learn about quantum computing and work together on projects using Qiskit.
No physics background or advanced programming experience is required. Meet collaborators during Saturday’s social hour before the hackathon kickoff.
Every participant receives a certificate and badge from IBM. Workshop topics, challenge prompts, mentors, and judging criteria will be posted here as they are confirmed.
All times listed below in Eastern Time (ET). Join sessions virtually using the virtual meeting link.
Saturday, October 24
Explore quantum science and engineering through demonstrations, exhibits, and conversations. See how quantum concepts connect to research and technology, and bring your questions as you get ready for the weekend’s activities.
Saturday, October 24 · Virtual Stream Available
A hands-on introduction to quantum computing with Qiskit. We'll cover the core ideas (qubits, superposition, entanglement and measurement), then build and run a quantum circuit on a simulator and on real IBM Quantum hardware. We'll finish with common pitfalls and project ideas you can build on over the weekend.
Keun Jun Park is a Software Engineer at Amazon Prime Video and an IBM Qiskit Advocate. At Purdue University (M.S. Industrial Engineering; B.S. Computer Science and Applied Statistics), Keun Jun researched quantum machine learning and built TREV, a GPU-accelerated tensor-network simulator for variational quantum algorithms. TREV was published in ACM Transactions on Quantum Computing and is part of the Qiskit Ecosystem. Keun Jun has also hosted a Qiskit Fall Fest and chaired a session at the Purdue Quantum AI Workshop.
Saturday, October 24 · Virtual Stream Available
Frontier AI has moved from models that answer questions to agents that take action. In this talk, I'll share how companies are actually using these systems today and how the engineer's role is changing as a result. I'll close with practical advice for students building careers in AI and emerging technologies.
Selena Park is a software engineer working on automatic speech recognition at Amazon AGI. Over four years in industry, she has built production AI systems spanning GPU model serving, LLM deployment, and evaluation of non-deterministic model outputs, and she also researches automatic prompt optimization with LLM-as-judge methods. She holds a BS in Computer Science and Applied Mathematics from SUNY Albany.
Saturday, October 24 · Virtual Stream Available
Get to know fellow participants, share your interests and experience, and find collaborators for the hackathon. Use this time to form a team and discuss how your different skills can contribute to a Qiskit project.
Saturday, October 24 · Virtual Stream Available
Review the newly released challenge prompts, hackathon rules, and judging criteria together. Teams can use this overview to understand the challenges, compare project ideas, and plan their approach before hacking starts.
Saturday, October 24
Start turning your team’s chosen idea into a Qiskit project. Divide tasks, explore an approach to the challenge, and begin building and testing your solution, with work continuing overnight and into Sunday until 4:00 PM.
Sunday, October 25
The project work period closes at 4:00 PM. Wrap up your implementation and prepare to explain your team’s approach, show what you built, and discuss your results during the presentations that follow in WALC 1018.
Sunday, October 25 · Virtual Stream Available
Share your team’s project with the judges and fellow participants. Walk through the challenge you tackled, explain your approach, and show your results while judges evaluate each project using the criteria shared at kickoff.
Sunday, October 25
Judges complete their evaluations, review project scores, and finalize the hackathon results ahead of the closing session. This judging period overlaps with the start of dinner for participants and organizers.
Sunday, October 25 · Virtual Stream Available
Come together for the announcement of the hackathon results and a chance to celebrate the work completed throughout the weekend. The event concludes with closing remarks from Purdue professor Grace Liang.
Schedule and session timing are subject to slight adjustments as needed. All times are Eastern Time (ET).
Open to all majors and experience levels.
Join Saturday’s talks and meet collaborators before the hackathon kickoff.
Come with a team or form one during the Saturday social hour. Team-size rules are coming soon.
Every participant receives a certificate and badge from IBM.
The event is open to Purdue students from any major and at any experience level.
No prior quantum experience is expected. Learning resources and workshop details will be shared before the event.
You may arrive with a team or meet collaborators at the event. Team-size requirements are TBD.
Every participant receives an IBM certificate and badge for taking part in Qiskit Fall Fest.
All virtual and hybrid sessions share one central meeting link. Click 'Join Virtual Meeting' anytime on this page to enter the live room in Eastern Time.
Explore the schedule, attend talks and workshops, and collaborate on quantum computing projects using Qiskit.
