Zhanping Zeng

College: Hunter College

Education Level: Senior

Career Interest: Software Developer; Owner of a start-up

I come from a family where most of the younger generation in my family work in the STEM industry, therefore it is natural for me to lean forward to start a career in the STEM industry. I appreciate the work style of being a software developer. And I am inspired to become one due to the flexibility and potential you have for being a software developer. My first interaction with programming was when I was in third grade trying to figure out how to change the language on a game boy stimulator. I changed the simple variable of a line of code from JP to EN, and my stimulator was able to run properly under my Windows environment. I was able to feel the impact that one line of code can have. I taught myself how to build a computer and save money when I was trying to build a PC in high school. It led to me wanting to have a career in the computer science field. I wanted to be a game designer at first, so I am trying to create video games using unity and unreal engine, but I realized that to become an indie game designer it is more about creating the graphics, which I am not talented at. Currently, I am working toward becoming a software developer. I think becoming a software developer will give me the most potential in entrepreneurship compare to other subfields in computer science. And my current goal in life is to build a start-up that creates impact to the society.

What was your role?

CS (SWE)

What did you work on?

What was the impact of your project?

I am on the chores team for my project. The project focuses on the idea of assigning chores to family members. To put it simple, this project would act like a middle man to reduce the awkwardness when the parents tell their children to do a chore. The project also provide other features such as privilege and visibility for each tasks and users so it adds different scenarios` usability. It attempt to develop long term positive habits, provide automation in chore management. The project would also have potentials for other features that are not implemented yet, for instance, showing a meaningful trend in habit development, or having snowflake systems, et etc.

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

What skills have you gained?

Learned how to use google cloud shell. Learned the correct way to communicate online. Learned how to use Jira to make backlog and assign tasks. Learned how launching a software developing internship feels like(with the first day talking about how to set up the environment and identify the goals on the second day).

What was the biggest roadblock you've overcome?

I was confused on the unadat_test.yaml file at first so it took me a while to set it up correctly.

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 maybe have recordings for the meetings in case there`s something you want to go back and re-watch, this is useful when there`s a tutorial of many steps in case you miss some crucial steps.