Computing Off Campus: Stepping Out of Your Comfort Zone

Tell me about your internship! What are your responsibilities? What projects are you working on over the summer?

I am a Target tech intern and I am on the payment gateway team, which is a backend team in Target tech for payment authorizations for Target.com or in stores. What I am currently working on is just trying to get to know the tech stack that we work with more, which is Java and Micronaut. A project I am doing over the summer is to build a health status application for the team. 

What is the most important thing you have learned thus far?

One of the most important things I’ve learned is trying to talk to as many people as possible in the company. I believe building connections with teammates, mentors, and people in many other areas has helped me expand my understanding of how things work at Target. It has also helped me see the bigger picture for the projects and learn the best practices and gain more from their experience, because they’ve already been through this. The conversations that I had with people have helped me feel more integrated into the company itself and made me feel more confident in gaining more knowledge to navigate a large organization like Target. 

How did your school work prepare you for this role?

The introductory computer science classes helped me a lot as it was a foundation for a lot of complex concepts that came on later. I was a teaching assistant (TA) for CSCI 1133: Introduction to Computing and Programming Concepts, and that was very helpful because I feel like you learn more from teaching when students ask you questions. The data structures classes are definitely foundational in problem solving and gaining more experience in the logic side was helpful. One of the courses I took last semester, CSCI 3081W: Program Design and Development, was one of the most helpful because it was a team-based class. It helps you work with other people and communicate with the whole team, which is important for an internship where you are also going to be communicating and working with a team. 

How did you become interested in computer science and what are your specific areas of interest?

I always enjoyed math since I was in middle school and high school, which was where I first started loving problem solving. I took the AP Computer Science exam in high school and I enjoyed studying for that, which is when I realized my interest in computer science. Data science is very adjacent to computer science, so I tested out a few statistics classes for that to see if I was interested. I really enjoyed those statistics classes and that is why I am double majoring in both of them. Currently, what I am most interested in is data mining, which combines computer science and data science perfectly. I think it was very interesting to see what we can extract out of data. 

What are your future career goals? How has this position impacted your goals?

My future goal is to work on something that can have a real impact, and this internship has made me work towards that goal more. Working at Target has shown me how important practices, collaboration, and design are when building systems that serve a lot of people. It made me see the kind of environment I want to work in, which is one that values mentorship, continuous learning, and being helpful with team members. It has made me even more determined to keep building my current skills and pursue a role later in either software engineering or data analysis.

What advice would you give to someone pursuing a similar internship in the future?

Try to get more out of your comfort zone. I feel like it’s easy to stick to what you already know, but I would say the best learning is when you take on new tasks or technologies. During this internship, I felt that when I volunteered for stuff that felt challenging, it definitely helped me grow way faster and made me feel more confident. Any future interns should see the internship as a space to try new things, ask questions, and push yourself as much as possible outside of your comfort zone.