After a few years hibernation, NWA TechFest roared back onto the scene on May 18, 2017.

The event was held at the Fayetteville Town Center, had over 250 attendees and was able to donate $5,000 in cash and materials to help upgrade the Donald W. Reynolds Boys and Girls Club computer lab.

The Keynote speakers were General Tamhra Hutchins-Frye and Colonel Bobbie Dorenbos discussing Arkansas Air National Guard tech and Kevin Clark, CEO of NOWDx.  The Arkansas Air National Guard also brought a MQ9 Reaper drone flight simulator and a mobile unit for emergency operations disaster relief.

Breakout session topics included: “Building Data Pipelines with Python”, “DevOps for the Little Guy”, and Crypto Before Computers”.