100. Isabel Nelson - Computer Science (soon to be) graduate; Kathy's daughter

Ordinarily Extraordinary - Conversations with women in STEM

Isabel Nelson is a senior majoring in computer science, minoring in business at Montana State University. She is in her last semester of college and is beginning to look for jobs.
What do we talk about in this episode?

Isabel talks about why she decided to go into computer science even though she had never taken a coding class before declaring her major.

1. How Post Secondary Education Option (PSEO) and starting college during COVID affected her college experience.
2. The difference between a BS and BA in computer science.
3. How to deal with social anxiety when you're starting to job hunt and interview.
4. Challenges of starting work life remotely. Her full remote internship was not a great entry into the work world.
5. The importance of internships and leveraging connections and networks to find and change jobs.
6. Don't be afraid or embarassed to find resources such as tutors to help you be successful in college.
7. Girls should be able to be themselves - dress how they want to, wear makeup, do their nails, etc. and be in STEM fields.
8. Normalizing girls and women in STEM in media, social media, etc. to make it more accessible to young girls/women.

Music used in the podcast: Higher Up, Silverman Sound Studio

Resources

"Hello World!": A complete Python-based computer programming tutorial with fun illustrations, examples, and hand-on exercises. (https://www.amazon.com/Hello-World-Computer-Programming-Kids/dp/161729702X/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2J3RCZ05QGXZU&keywords=hello+world+python&qid=1676681470&sprefix=hello+world+pyt%2Caps%2C190&sr=8-1)

In software engineering, the terms frontend and backend (or sometimes referred to as back end or back-end) refer to the separation of concernsbetween the presentation layer (frontend), and the data access layer (backend) of a piece of software, or the physical infrastructure or hardware. In the client–server model, the client is usually considered the frontend and the server is usually considered the backend, even when some presentation work is actually done on the server itself. (wikipedia)

Esteffanie - A YouTube content creator who likes to build things and share my projects, experiments, and failures on my YouTube and Instagram channels. (https://www.estefannie.com)

Grace Hopper Celebration - Created in 1994 and inspired by the legacy of Admiral Grace Murray Hopper, the AnitaB.org flagship event Grace Hopper Celebration brings the research and career interests of women in computing to the forefront. (https://ghc.anitab.org)

In computer graphics, turtle graphics are vector graphics using a relative cursor (the "turtle") upon a Cartesian plane (x and y axis).

Girlboss, also known as girlboss-ism, is a neologism popularised by Sophia Amoruso in her 2014 book Girlboss, which denotes a woman "whose success is defined in opposition to the masculine business world in which she swims upstream". The concept's ethos has been described as "convenient incrementalism". (wikipedia)

Junior Achievement’s mission is to inspire and prepare young people to succeed. The inspiration piece comes from community volunteers who not only deliver our lessons, but share their experience. In the process, these volunteers serve as role models helping to positively impact young people’s perceptions about the importance of education, as well as critical life skills. (https://jausa.ja.org/programs/index)