“I started to develop a project from scratch: a dynamic graph-render for in your browser!”

Welcome to #humansofcodam — the internship special!

In these interview series, the students share successes and losses, memorable and learning moments, and everything in between!

Meet Emily (19) @ Driebit 👋

Since day 1 we have been very impressed by Emily. She is one of our fastest students to progress in the curriculum. After 6 months she finalized her internship. However, the company was not ready to let go yet, because she is working 2 extra months with them before continuing her studies at Codam!

Looking back over the past 6 months: what skills did you gain?

“At Driebit, in terms of technical skills, I have learned web development and setting up the back-end of websites! It is very inspiring to work with a team from ideation to the final product. Everyone has a different role in a team and it is cool to experience how everyone brings a different skill to the table. With one of the projects I helped with, I was involved from the start. That website is live now! You can have a look at it here: https://www.openluchtmuseum.nl/.”

What was your favourite moment during your internship?

“At the moment, Driebit is an agency that is developing websites. However, currently, we are designing new products to offer to our clients. In my very first month, we had in-depth discussions with the team about how to design and structure these new products. It was very special for me to be part of designing these new products! My voice was heard and my ideas were implemented.”

How have you changed during your internship?

“Mostly, I have a better view on where I stand in my programming skills. Before my internship started, I did not have a good idea of my technical level. It was hard for me to acknowledge what I could or couldn’t do. However, with this internship, I brought this in context: what am I good at, what do I like, where can I still grow?

Next to that, I have always been a bit unsure about myself. Codam has helped me tremendously to build up my confidence in terms of technical skills, but mostly in terms of working together with other people. During my internship, this confidence has grown more because I could apply my newly built confidence in practice and experienced that it worked!”

What was the toughest challenge during your internship?

“There is an endless amount of new projects that you are working on. In the last few months, I started to develop a project from scratch. Something that has never been done at the company before: a dynamic graph render for in your browser. This has been very challenging and rewarding at the same time! It helps that I chose the graphics branch in the curriculum at Codam. The skills that I learned in these projects, I can now apply to this graph render.”

What surprised you the most, either about yourself or about the internship?

“I discovered that peer programming is really something that works for me. You work together and you learn a lot from each other. At the beginning of my internship, I was working with someone else on the project. She has been working at the company for a while but actually, I knew a lot more things than she did! Therefore, I could really teach her some things which helped me gain even a better understanding and build confidence!”

If your internship coordinator would describe you in one sentence, what would he/she say?

“That I am not afraid to start something that is new or weird, that I love to experiment a lot!”

What are your next steps?

“My internship ended, but I am working for 2 more months full-time at Driebit. Afterward, I am excited to go back to Codam and continue the second part of the curriculum where I specialize in a topic!”

Codam Coding College is the only peer-to-peer coding institution in the Netherlands, with a world-class curriculum empowering the next leading generation of tech talent. Through our educational model, students are trained to become qualified software engineers and design inclusive solutions for the challenges of today and tomorrow! At Codam, students build technical expertise and grow adaptability, autonomy, and empathy, in close collaboration with private and public partners. We believe Codam students are ready to #writethefuture!