My TIIDELab Experience 1.0 (First Month).
Two days to the month of August, I got an email from TIIDELab stating I got accepted into the cohort 2 Software Development Fellowship, 2020.
Introduction
Now, a brief summary of my journey into the TIIDELab house. I applied for the first cohort with very high hopes of getting in due to my Computer Science background but got my hopes dashed with a rejection. I kept in touch with some acquaintances I met during the interview and followed TIIDELab and a few management staff on Twitter. I followed the training updates of the selected fellows, asked a few about what they were learning/building and was thrilled at how much they were growing.
When applications for the next cohort was opened, one of the fellows notified me and I applied immediately, this time with a more open mind. I took the required online test, got a score (66.67%) below the pass mark (70%), thought this was the end of the road for me but was shocked when an email from TIIDELab hit my mailbox stating I made it to the next interview phase. During this interview, I was quizzed by experts in tech, business and human capacity building, provided answers to the best of my knowledge and here I am, a TIIDELab fellow.
What have I learned so far?
Over the past month, I have been exposed to critical thinking, problem identification/framing, and clear communication techniques. Every morning (Mondays to Thursdays) fellow are required to take an 8 minutes Criteria Cognitive Aptitude Test (CCAT) of 20 questions, the goal is to be able to provide correct answers to about 50 questions in 5 minutes. So far I have progressed from scoring 35% to 75% and hope to improve as times goes on. Once a week fellows meet for non-technical training. During this period we are given various tasks that involve a real-world problem, in one of this meetings, my team was asked to identify problems and proffer solutions associated with the registration and issuance of Yellow Fever Card in Nigeria, we were able to do so by using the above-mentioned skills. As one of the most important skills that I am developing, critical thinking will be valuable for a developer as he/she is sometimes tasked with creating products that a minor error could result in loss of financial resources and the likes. These three skills act as pillars necessary for me to have a successful career as a developer not forgetting empathy.
I was shown how data structures and algorithm goes a long way to give meaning to a problem one is trying to solve with any given programming language especially with the introduction to Big O Notation.
Every fellow is required to learn basic HTML, CSS and JavaScript, irrespective of your track. So far, we have been taught HTML CSS and Git Version Control, with this knowledge, I built my portfolio (still work in progress though as features are been added as learning continues), find the link here. As someone on the Backend track, I so much love this as this will help me not only write code that works but one that is also efficient and with the proper API documentation. I also get to work with very smart individuals that challenge me, as fellows are from various fields of engineering and social science.
Moments and Highlights
One of the highlights of my first month was when my team won a challenge that gave us the privilege of making a team member the Head of House (HOH). Ah yes, the HOH is like the representative of all fellows. There is also the position of Deputy Head of House (DHOH) since the program is running simultaneously in both Abuja and Lagos, HOH and DHOH can not be fellows from a single location at a given time.
As someone that enjoys peer learning, I always look forward to the Friday meetups as this allows me to connect better with instructors and fellows, not forgetting to mention that classes are remote from Monday to Thursday.
Where am I now?
TIIDELab has made me see software engineering as a process were thinking and planning makes the writing of code much easier as I don’t just jump to writing code when trying to solve a problem without first checking to see how others have tried solving the same problem, using the insight I gained from such research to provide a better way of solving a said problem without reinventing the wheel.
Currently part of a team that is working on a Project Management Tool for both technical and non-technical users. Update on this project will be in my next article.
Conclusion
This awesome experience won’t have been possible without the entire management of TIIDELab, Industrial Training Fund, Nigeria (ITF), Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association (NECA) and wonderful instructors, not forgetting you reading this, thanks a million.
