Hello Outreachy!
Tags: outreachy
Published: 2019-06-10 11:51:48

Hello again,

I am Aarthi Rajaraman. I am selected as one of the 43 interns of the Outreachy (May - August) '19 round.

I work under the Jenkins community through Outreachy program and I am mentored by Matt Sicker. I also have a colleague from Outreachy, Gayathri also working under the Jenkins community.

Below is a questionnaire answered to share my experience applying to the Outreachy program.

What motivated you to apply to Outreachy?
I happened to know about Outreachy before a short while. The Outreachy program encourages diverse people to be a part of it. I could see that I am somewhere fitting in the list of people who are encouraged to apply and I gave it a try. The write-ups of the previous interns were very supportive to make the application and contributions.

What were you excited about when thinking about applying?
I was excited to work under a professional setup from home if I get into it. I was looking for a huge knowledge gain from working with experienced developers. Also, the tag of being an Outreachy intern also excited me.


What made you passionate about the project you applied to?
I had a little working knowledge of Java which was listed as one of the required skills for the project. Also, I have heard of Jenkins before and have seen people using it in the team at one of the companies I was working before. 


What was confusing about the Outreachy application process?
I was confused after completing the initial application form as to do what after that. Later, I got to know that I have to wait until the Outreachy team evaluates and confirms my application.

Otherwise, the application workflow is very smooth. All the needed information is available in the Outreachy site. We just need to put in more attention to the details.

How did you find information?
I was introduced to Outreachy by a family friend's son who was part of the Google Summer of Code that he calls GSoC before.

Who did you ask questions of when you were stuck?
I posted all my question to the Jenkins community channel. Either mentors or the other outreachy applicants helped me with answers. The previous interns were also working on the project when I was applying to it. They also helped me and other applicants on our questions.

How did you mentor help you during the application process?
Mentor helped me by answering most of my questions and also helped me to split the tasks to work on. Also, he helped me by reviewing the pull requests that I submitted to the code base. Along with helping in the project, he also helped me with understanding of Git and GitHub workflows. I sincerely thank him for the support.

What would you tell someone who is worried about applying to Outreachy?
As an applicant, do not be much worried as the people you're trying to get in touch with are very helping. The communities are very much welcoming. They understand that you're a newbie and are ready to accommodate your sensible doubts. If you didn't get a chance this year, try the next year. In fact, my colleague from Outreachy at Jenkins this year had an experience of applying to Outreachy before under different communities.

Wish you and me a very happy coding :) 


Thanks for reading,
Aarthi