Gustavo Grijalba

College: Hunter College

Education Level: Sophomore

Career Interest: Web Development, ML

Hi! My name is Gustavo Grijalba and I am a current sophomore computer science student at Hunter College and an aspiring software/web developer. I love learning new things, especially when they help me in creating something I am passionate about or think is interesting (such as HTML and CSS, which have helped me create personal websites that I am proud of despite their amateurish look). Outside of computer science, I am really into reading, movies, and cats! My favorite book is The Sailor who Fell from Grace with the Sea by Yukio Mishima; Mishima's flowery prose makes even the dark and disturbing seem beautiful in this book -- it's an absolutely fantastic read. I am also really into gothic literature, some of my favorites are The Turn of the Screw by Henry James, The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson, and Dracula by Bram Stoker: I find it really interesting that with just words on a page I can feel such intense feelings of dread, anxiety, and fear. Naturally, I am also heavily invested into horror movies and their sub-genres. My favorite movie is Kiyoshi Kurosawa's Cure; it's not only an enticing detective story, but also an unsettling exploration of the human psyche. My love for both literature and cinema has led me to pursue photography as a hobby, and I'd hope that I'd be able to create stories with just pictures in the future. I am also a big lover of cats! I own three cats named Dior, Pancha and Pancho. All my cats are either rescues or from shelters. My hope in the future is to receive TNR certification so I can help save more cats from the streets and put them into loving homes. That's all from me -- thank you for reading my little blurb! I hope you've learned a little more about me.

What was your role?

UX/UI

What did you work on?

What was the impact of your project?

As a UX/UI designer and beta tester, I have to ensure that the product we are delivering to the customer meets their needs. In doing so, we would ensure that our company mission and purpose is received as effectively as possible. I personally believe this is one of the more important goals, because even if we were to have amazing code and an amazing mission that is beneficial for society to match, none of it would matter if we were unable to make it accesible to the audience we are trying to reach. Thus, my group and the project I am working on have to ensure that we add features that not only adheres to the mission statement of Unadat, but also reaches our target audience and makes our mission and purpose accesible.

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

What skills have you gained?

A new piece of knowledge I`ve picked up thus far in the onboarding is the ability to live edit code using inspect element. I`ve already known that I could edit the actual HTML, but a new thing I`ve learned was that I can edit the CSS-styling of the element I`m selecting. I think this is a useful piece of knowledge as I could edit the code of Unadat`s website without actually changing anything permanently, allowing for easy beta-testing/ideation.

What was the biggest roadblock you've overcome?

As for roadblocks, I haven`t overcome any regarding the project so far, but I can imagine there will be in the future. I have no prior experience in UX/UI design, so the entire designing process that was showed to me was entirely new. However, I feel that with my prior HTML and CSS experience, I believe I can quickly adapt to whatever is needed of me.

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?

I think using Discord was very effective and convenient, as I am sure many of us have already had the application. It also lets multiple people share their screen at once, so if they had a question they needed to show, it wouldn`t disrupt the livestream of anyone else. I think for the future it may be beneficial to send the onboarding slides to their respective chat threads, as it could be good review for those who may want to work at their own pace.