Join us in T1 during the O-week stall to play games, win prizes, and take a gift hamper for your membership

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What is DSEC

About the Deakin Software Engineering Club

Deakin's home for students who want to build real software, not just pass assignments.

The Deakin Software Engineering Club (DSEC) is an academic and professional student club based at the Melbourne Burwood campus. We bring together software engineering, computer science, IT, and design students who want to learn modern development, work in real project teams, and connect with industry while they study.

DSEC is affiliated with the Deakin University Student Association (DUSA) and operates as the official software engineering club at Burwood. Our events and projects are run by students, for students, with support from Deakin and DUSA.

Ship portfolio-ready software in small teams

Host workshops, coding nights, and hackathons

Invite industry guests and alumni speakers

Create a friendly community to grow together

If you care about building things, learning from peers, and getting closer to tech careers, this is your club.

DSEC

Est. Late 2010s

Our story at Deakin

Our journey so far

DSEC has been part of Deakin's tech community for years. The logo has changed a little, the exec teams have changed a lot, but the core idea has stayed the same: help Deakin students learn, build, and find their people through software engineering.

Early Days

From game jams to our first hackathon

The club started in the late 2010s, when a small group of Deakin students decided they wanted more than just lectures. Early events focused on mini game jams, hackathons, and casual dev nights where people could experiment with code, eat pizza, and build weird little projects together.

We hosted events like LeadHack, an annual hackathon that challenged students to design and ship working prototypes in a single day, plus small game jams where teams made their first playable games in a weekend. Those events set the tone for DSEC as a place where it is okay to try, fail, and learn in public.

Growing Up

Workshops, industry panels, and a bigger community

Over time, DSEC moved from just hackathons into a wider mix of technical and career events. We ran sessions with companies like Amazon and Macquarie, datathons with Alteryx and other Deakin clubs, and regular skills workshops on topics like Git, backend development, and cloud.

We also started collaborating more across campus with groups like DUCA, DDSC, DBAS, and BAP, running joint hackathons, trivia nights, and networking evenings that brought together software, data, business, and cyber students in the same room.

Reset

Losing momentum and rebuilding trust

Behind the scenes, 2025 was one of the toughest years in DSEC's history. Executive transitions were messy, knowledge was lost, and we struggled to communicate clearly with members. Event momentum dropped, trust in the club slipped, and it felt like DSEC might quietly fade away.

In Trimester 2, a new executive team stepped in mid-trimester with almost no handover. We started with basics: talking honestly about what went wrong, listening to feedback, running smaller events we knew we could deliver, and rebuilding a bigger volunteer team around clearer roles and expectations.

Today

DSEC today — build real projects together

Today, DSEC is focused on helping Deakin students ship real, portfolio-ready software while feeling part of a supportive community. We run development sessions that simulate a real software team environment, where members learn version control, code reviews, agile planning, and how to collaborate in GitHub.

Around those sessions, we run React workshops, coding nights, speaker events, and stalls at O-Fest and T-stalls to meet new members in person. We also launched a new Discord server so members can keep learning, asking questions, and sharing wins between events.

The club is still evolving, but the goal is simple: if you stay engaged with DSEC through your degree, you should graduate with a real project portfolio, industry connections, and friends who were there for every late-night debugging session.

Where we're going next

Our vision for DSEC at Deakin

Our vision is for every Deakin student who is serious about software engineering to have a clear path from first-year curiosity to job-ready confidence, supported by a club that feels like a real dev team and a real community.

Core objectives for members

Help students ship at least one hackathon-level project before graduation
Teach modern software practices — Git, agile, reviews, collaboration — alongside technical skills
Make it easier to meet peers, mentors, and industry contacts at Deakin
Support students from all backgrounds to feel welcome in tech and stay in the pipeline

Core objectives for partners

Offer a simple way for companies and staff to meet motivated student developers
Co-create events that are genuinely useful for both student learning and recruitment
Showcase student projects and success stories to highlight Deakin's software talent

We want DSEC to be known as the place where Deakin students actually build things, not just talk about them.

Who runs DSEC

Meet the DSEC executive team

DSEC is led by a volunteer executive committee of Deakin students who handle everything from event planning and sponsorship to Discord moderation and code review nights. Executives are elected at our Annual General Meeting each year, following DUSA club rules and requirements.

Below you'll find our executive roles. The exact people change every year, but the responsibilities stay consistent so the club can grow sustainably.

President

Leads the club, sets direction, and makes sure we actually deliver what we promise members

Vice-President

Supports the president, coordinates teams, and helps new volunteers succeed

Secretary

Keeps us organised, handles minutes, email, and DUSA paperwork

Treasurer

Keeps budgets, grants, and sponsorship money clean and compliant

Head of Design

Creates visual identity, marketing materials, and event branding

Head of Development

Leads technical workshops, project sessions, and code review nights

Head of Marketing

Manages socials, communications, and member outreach

Head of Events

Plans and executes hackathons, workshops, and social events

Head of Community

Moderates Discord, welcomes new members, and builds culture

Head of External Affairs

Manages partnerships, sponsorships, and industry relationships

If you are a Deakin student who cares about building communities, this is one of the best ways to grow your leadership and project skills while you study.

How we behave as a community

Safe, inclusive, and DUSA-affiliated

DSEC is a DUSA-affiliated club. That means we follow Deakin and DUSA guidelines for student conduct, incident management, and safe events on campus and online. We are committed to keeping our Discord, events, and projects welcoming for students of all backgrounds, identities, and experience levels.

We expect members to

Treat others with respect, both online and in person

Give constructive feedback on code and ideas, never personal attacks

Help create spaces where women, non-binary students, international students, and other under-represented groups in tech can participate fully

Follow DUSA and Deakin policies on harassment, discrimination, alcohol, and safety at events

If something doesn't feel right at a DSEC event or in our online spaces, talk to an exec or contact DUSA directly. We take concerns seriously and will act in line with DUSA's incident management processes.

Read our conduct summary

Want to be part of the next chapter?

For Students

If you're a Deakin student who wants to build real projects, meet other developers, and feel more confident about internships and grad roles, we'd love to see you at a DSEC event this trimester.

For Partners

If you're an industry partner, recruiter, or staff member who wants to work with motivated Deakin students, reach out. We can help with guest talks, workshops, hackathons, and project collaborations.