Christina Asquith, COO

Zach Latta, founder

Jan 27, 2021

Today, we're proud to share: Tom and Theresa Preston-Werner are donating $500,000 to Hack Club.

We are deeply grateful for this gift.

In the coming months, we hope you’ll share our excitement as we make 2 new hires directly serving Hack Clubbers. This gift increases Hack Club’s budget by 60%, and helps us build a diverse foundation at the leadership level of Hack Club as we grow.

We are so honored to be included among the many gifts the Preston-Werners make each year. This is the 3rd year the Preston-Werners have given a gift to Hack Club, and they've supported the organization from the beginning.

Tom and Theresa inspire Hack Club's values. They are self-made hackers, passionate about constructing a better world in creative ways. They are deeply committed to environmental protection, women’s rights, ending global poverty and injustice; and are tremendous collaborators in making Hack Club a place where all young people can build and create their own solutions through coding and technology, regardless of their background. They apply rigorous-thinking, curiosity, humility, transparency, and deep expertise in academia and coding to the problems that need solving in the world, and inspire us to do the same.

The Preston-Werners generously donate dozens of hours of their time each year to Hack Club HQ and Hack Clubbers. Theresa has been a steady champion of Hack Club, supporting us with feedback, advice, editing, and meeting with Hack Club students. Tom is a founding board member and a personal mentor of Zach’s for the last 5 years. Just some of the ways they support Hack Club is that they inspired the idea to launch Hack Club’s “Ask Me Anything” series, and Tom was our first speaker last April. In December 2019, they threw an amazing Christmas party at their San Francisco home for Hack Club.

Their incredible and generous gift ushers Hack Club into a big new year in which we get closer to our vision to build a new cultural institution for the 21st century akin to the Boy and Girl Scouts, in which we support high schoolers to gain critical computer science skills, healthy, fun and wholesome friendships, and a set of modern values that honor kindness, integrity, inclusivity, curiosity, optimism, and building and doing.

We send them a huge thank you. To every Hack Clubber: Tom and Theresa are now supporting you and your work, so go forth and do amazing things. We can’t wait to show them what you make.

—Christina Asquith, COO, and Zach Latta, founder