Cover image from Career opportunities in technology by Awa-Oyom Glory.

Read this post on Ushahidi blog.

Previous Outreachy article: Modifying expectations.

Introduction

Three more weeks to the end of internship with Ushahidi (and Outreachy). Missing working here, meetings with Anna and Ushahidi tech team already 😭😭😭 Contributing to Ushahidi's code base as an open source contributor and subsequently working as an intern has helped me keep an open mind. For example, I never thought I will have anything to do with angularjs. Yes I have taken courses in angular 7+ and built stuff with it, but it is a lot different from angularjs. Apart from the fact that angularjs is an old technology (thank God for the ongoing migration at Ushahidi), I never really liked to learn it.

I took one angularjs related course once and concluded it was hard and would never be able to comprehend it. Now look at me happily 😂 staring at angularjs code almost all day. For 10 months now (counting from Outreachy's October 2020 contribution period to July 2021) I've been actively submitting angularjs related contributions, all thanks to the very welcoming environment here at Ushahidi. This, and the awesome people I've interacted with are what kept me hanging around Ushahidi in the first place, and will keep me around even after the internship.

Career Opportunities and what next

The truth is that I don't have all of it figured out yet, but I will like to get a remote job at an organisation where I feel like I'm at home and where I can grow. Before Outreachy and Ushahidi ever happened to me, I have taken mobile web specialist training and have knowledge of javascript, angular, css, less and nodejs (I learnt react too one time). Ushahidi exposed me to angularjs, scss and the very interesting single-spa 😍 I have also picked up interest in a number of things: technical writing, research, organising, architecture, support, mentoring and open source software. So I'll be looking out for web development and software engineering opportunities where I get to work with or do any of these. Like I mentioned in the introduction, I'm keeping an open mind and if need be learn new technologies along the way.

Pending the time that things will work out and will find a remote job, I plan to give back to the communities that have really contributed to my growth. I'm volunteering to mentor mobile web specialist learners in this year's Google Africa Developer Scholarship program. Time to put all the things I've learnt from mentor Anna Losif to use (rubbing palms together). I'll also not be far from Ushahidi. I look forward to continue assisting in anyway I can - writing code, improving documentation and helping new applicants and interns. I will continue building and working on my Code Collabo portfolio project, continue my Google IT support professional certificate course, take more courses and engage in programs that will that will improve chances of being hired even with my non-CS degree background.

Conclusion

I'll be publishing my final Outreachy blog post about what I worked on in weeks 8 - 13 soon. After that, let's just see where "tech wind" will blow me to 😉

Find me on github, twitter and/or linkedIn.

Final Outreachy article: Outreachy Internship wrap-up.