How A 2nd Year CS Undergrad Landed Their Internship Using ZTM

Don’t get me wrong, University and College courses can be amazing. Sure they are super costly, but you get to meet new people, follow a structured learning plan at a good pace, and have an incredible time.

The problem of course is that the tech industry advances so fast that you can’t always cover what's important (or even still relevant) in a College course, which is why it’s important to supplement your training with other sources.

Heck, even full-time devs take online training to help fast track their further knowledge and remove any gaps, especially if they need experience in a specific language or framework to help them close a job offer.

There’s nothing wrong with this at any level, and it’s how one of our students recently landed an internship while still in College.

If you're currently studying and trying to learn how to get a programming internship for yourself, well maybe todays success story can help give you some ideas.

Allow me to introduce you to Mueez…

Who are you?

I'm Mueez Khan, an undergraduate computer science student at Rutgers University, and a Summer 2022 intern at a private startup called Rearc.

I’ve been in the ZTM community since July 2021, right after my freshman year.

What do you do?

I mainly implement internal solutions for Rearc's production data platform that provides data sets to customers such as Moderna and Mastercard.

I work on the data platform's Amazon Web Services (AWS) infrastructure using AWS Cloud Development Kit (CDK) with Python and performing data analysis through a Databricks notebook (like a Jupyter Notebook that uses Python).

Using these tools, I've been adding certain AWS resources to the data platform that lower costs (a VPC gateway endpoint) and enable network IP traffic logging (VPC flow logs) for data analysis.

I also wrote a technical blog post that’s published on the company blog going over Python code that I've worked on and got into production.

What did you do before you got your internship?

Before getting my internship, I was trying to build experience in working with teams through university clubs.

Why did you want to join Zero To Mastery?

My first message in the ZTM Discord community sums it up well!

I wanted to join ZTM because there were skills I wanted to learn that my current university courses haven't been offering and I wanted an organized path for learning to elevate my skills with each course I go through.

ZTM's career paths made it simple for me to understand the different fields I could explore and I wanted to make sure I actually complete my courses so I got a ZTM subscription for a year to make sure I made use of it.

That's awesome, Mueez but can you break it down for us... what exactly did you learn and how did you get your internship?

Last year I studied from ZTM’s Complete Web Developer course to help as a volunteer frontend developer for the RnD team at Rutgers’ most popular hackathon HackRU.

From this course, I learned about Web Development concepts that were new to me such as, Javascript, React, what’s a frontend vs. backend vs. database, etc, while at the same time contributing to the React codebase.

Then at the start of this year, I completed ZTM's Complete Python course since I wanted to learn what other fields I can use programming for.

I chose this course because Python is also a very in-demand skill to have, and I wanted to make sure I felt comfortable using Python as a primary language and for interviews too.

Editor's note:

Python and Javascript are the two best languages that we recommend beginner programmers should learn first. (Either is fine but these are the best to start with).

Why?

• Both Python and Javascript offer multiple opportunities to work on different projects and roles on front or backend (especially when you add in frameworks, runtimes, and libraries)
• They’re both easy to learn
• They both have high job demand. There are 201,727 Javascript Dev jobs on ZipRecruiter at the time of writing vs 387,972 Python jobs

• They each have a good average salary ($85,000-$149,000 USD for Javascript and $92,000-$150,000 USD for Python)

• That salary is even higher if you then niche down further and learn Javascript + React or Python + Django
• Both Python and Javascript are excellent first touch points if you want to learn something more specialized later on like Solidity to get into blockchain etc.

Anyway, back to Mueez…

So I learned Python first. Then, when ZTM's AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner (CCP) course was released in May I decided to try learning about the cloud because I didn’t have much of a clue about how it worked, cloud skills are in-demand, and I thought I may as well learn from the course with my subscription and passed the certification exam.

From learning about Web Development and Python skills, I was able to fulfill a family friend’s request to develop a full-stack website for querying and storing cemetery records. My father then shared this project with a friend that co-founded Rearc and this referral led to an interview.

I expected to see FAANG type questions around data structures and algorithms problems during my interviews but I was surprised that they provided take-home assignments instead that used Python, AWS, and optionally Terraform skills. (This made sense as it was what the company uses).

So, I went ahead and decided to learn from the ZTM Terraform bootcamp as I thought the infrastructure-as-code knowledge would be useful since it seems like a popular DevOps skill.

I completed the interview assignments using the skills I learned and landed the internship!

I cannot stress enough how much this helped. The computer science courses available to me in my first two years weren't focused much on teaching Web Development, Python, Cloud, or Terraform at all, so ZTM helped fill those gaps for me which benefitted my volunteer work, course work, and now my real work at my internship!

Were there any difficulties after you joined ZTM? What was your learning experience like?

When I took my first course, it took me much longer than subsequent courses and I found React to be intimidating at first so I made sure I took my time learning by taking notes while also managing my course work.

Thankfully ZTM doesn't teach solely from static slides and textbooks but instead, they provide animations, diagrams, exercises, and projects that all help me understand concepts much better.

Editors note:

This is actually a common struggle when learning which is literally why we created the courses in this way to help people get past these issues. It means you learn faster, build confidence and remember the content.

Back to Mueez…

This really helped me with getting experience in learning how to learn for my new role also.

How?

When I joined my internship I had trouble understanding a lot of AWS services that were used because I’ve only learned up to the AWS CCP level. This was a good experience though because I was able to learn on the job directly using AWS while also continuing my AWS studies for a higher tier/more specific AWS certification.

I also jumped straight into the huge codebase for their data platform, so I had to explore how it was organized and communicate with my new team to figure out where I can start working.

It felt a bit overwhelming at first since there was so much to learn, but I took things one task at a time. I also referred to the documentation very frequently and asked any questions I had to coworkers and Google.

Editor's Note:

This is one of the best ways to learn at any level. Always ask if unsure. Your boss will love you for it and you won’t get stuck in soloist or perfectionist imposter syndrome.

Now that you have your new position, how do you feel?

I feel like this is a miracle.

Honestly, I thought I would be spending my summer doing Web Development side projects, studying from ZTM's Data Structures and Algorithms courses, and only applying to internships now for next summer, as it’s usually more common to get internships during the summer after junior year.

But I was so lucky that I was able to get a huge head start by learning useful skills from ZTM and get it early on instead.

Thanks to filling in these knowledge gaps with ZTM, I feel like I now have a better understanding of the opportunities I'd be interested in pursuing for my career while also having real skills and experience for my next endeavor.

Finally, is there a big difference in earnings in this new role from what you made before?

Of course, because I've only been volunteering in clubs for years for free up till now! My father likes to tell me: "learn while you earn," and I was finally able to do that.

I got real experience and passed my AWS Solutions Architect Associate certification exam without paying a cent for either the educational material or the exam cost since they were reimbursed from my internship!

Even better still, I’ve started tracking my finances so I can support my family and relatives, save up for future expenses, and calculate how many açaí bowls I can afford!

Do YOU want to start learning to code?

If you’re like Mueez and are looking to fill any knowledge gaps to land that an internship, or even just getting started learning to program, then you can check out the multiple courses we have here at ZTM. We have a whole selection from coding, design, security, hacking, blockchain, and much more, as well as advanced advice on how to get hired, even without a degree!

Or if you’re not sure where to start, check out our custom career path quiz for some advice on where to start.

You answer specific questions about your goals and the life you want and how you want to work, and the quiz will point out the best role for you, as well as where to start learning on a structured path so you can get hired asap!

Then, be sure to check in and let us know YOUR success story! 🙌💰😃