Taseen Islam

College: Macaulay Honors College

Education Level: Sophomore

Career Interest: Machine Learning Engineer in Biotech using AI to combat cancer and other terminal illnesses.

Hello! My name is Taseen Islam and I am a sophomore at the Macaulay Honors College studying a Computer Science, Computational Math, and Applied Math triple major. My interests lie in biotech and how tech and AI can be used to combat cancer, aid drug discovery, and make medical research faster and more efficient. I'm also interested in the cross between tech, politics, and ethics and would love to chat about these topics. I was a chemistry major in high school, but after working at a cancer nanotechnology lab at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center for over a year, I realized I couldn't see myself doing benchwork for the rest of my life. However, I fell in love with the software and data analysis tools I used in the lab and saw how much technology could help with advancing research and making a positive impact on the scientific community. This led me to declare Computer Science as my major in college. Just this past January, I participated in the Impact Fellowship, a program bringing students together to create tech for social good. My group and I created an SMS-based chatbot for refugees that taught coding tutorials in over 100 languages, complete with an AI tutor. I saw the potential of technology for social good and this project pushed me to further explore the intersection of technology, education, and public good. I want to have a direct impact on the health and happiness of others, and my dream is to do this by combining software and biology to create tools such as artificial intelligence to aid in drug discovery or data analysis models to predict the spread of disease. I love to learn and debate new uses for tech in politics and healthcare, so if you find any cool articles or lectures about innovative AI and other new technologies, please send them to me, thank you!

What was your role?

CS (SWE)

What did you work on?

What was the impact of your project?

I am on GM. One of the most important aspects of successfully completing a major project is knowing the vision of what you want to happen and how you`re going to make that happen. This means knowing your goals and milestones and tracking your progress for them. The GM team will help Unadat users plan out how they will track and attack their debt so that they can make consistent progress towards their debt goals. It is imperative that we create a welcoming and efficient space for users to easily create goals, plan how they will tackle them, and then actually take their actions. If people lose sight of their progress, they might forget where they started and feel like they have done nothing. It happens to people at the gym all the time. Our team has to make sure users don`t forget all the incredible progress they made. They are taking on the difficult and scary task of taking on debt, and it is our job to make sure they feel accomplished every time they complete a goal or hit a milestone. If the user doesn`t feel good, they`ll quit their debt-fighting journey, so we need to keep them on track and create systems that encourage them to keep going during this long process.

What did you learn or improve on from this internship or from your teammates?

What skills have you gained?

Google Cloud uses the terminal for pushing code changes, but I am more used to using GitHub desktop for that. I have been looking into Git and how to better use the terminal, which has been an immensely helpful skill to learn. I have also learned a lot more about financing different things in my future and have thought more about how I would create plans to comfortably save to finance a car, house, and other things I want.

What was the biggest roadblock you've overcome?

My biggest roadblock has been more mental than anything tangible. I used to question my place in the tech industry for a long time and worried that I would never get a chance to prove to myself that this is a place where I belong and can thrive. Getting this internship and having a great onboarding week has helped me prove to myself that I can actually make it in this field and bring about a better future for my family and myself.

How has company culture guided your work?

What was your experience at Unadat?

What was one big project you worked on during the internship? Can you walk me through the process?

What advice would you give to future interns?

This may be your first tech internship and you may be worried, but don`t worry. Take a deep breath and follow the instructions Sean and Dan give you. They`ve given wonderful help throughout this process and have made onboarding super easy. Get comfortable with your teammates, learn more about the people you`re working with, and get ready for the exciting internship ahead of you.