Harvey Mudd College students

The morning sun hits Elizabeth Poss, 19, left, and Lauren Hu, 20, as they work on their “Sleep Dep Buddy” project at the MuddHacks, a Harvey Mudd College hardware hackathon, in October. The light-sensitive robot was designed to cause a ruckus if its owner doesn’t turn off the light and go to bed to get enough sleep.

(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)

Dec. 24, 2016 2:42 PM PT

Computer science students at Harvey Mudd College toil on a variety of projects for MuddHacks, a hardware hackathon in which they create and design products using their programming and building skills. The college now has more female students than male students who graduate with computer science degrees.

Cordelia Stiff, 19, Elizabeth Poss, 19, Lauren Hu, 20, and Mackenzie Kong-Sivert, 19, work on their “Sleep Dep Buddy” project.

(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)

Elizabeth Poss, 19, works on her “Sleep Dep Buddy” project at Harvey Mudd College, whose students organized the hackathon to create and design products using their programming and building skills.

(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)

Lauren Hu, 20, works on her group project, the “Sleep Dep Buddy,” at the MuddHacks hardware hackathon at Harvey Mudd in October.

(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)

Zayra Lobo, 20, Andrew Bishop, 20, Nancy Wei, 20, and Zachary Shattler, 19, work under a dark early morning sky, on their Theremin project, an electronic musical instrument, for the MuddHacks hardware hackathon at Harvey Mudd in October.

(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)