We spoke to the Impact Lab students interns at FSI during the Spring 2021 semester to find out their learnings and experiences at the Impact Lab, as well as their take on social impact.
In this series, meet Syed Muhammad Ali Murtaza Jaffery, Software Engineer Intern at Foundation for Shared Impact.
Tell us about yourself? Which year are you in and what subject are you majoring in? What is one fun fact that people don’t know about you? What is the best thing about being you right now?
Hi everyone, I am a year two student studying Computer Science at The University of Hong Kong. I am from Pakistan and I enjoy socializing and coding. I believe not many people know the fact that I am a good chef. And I think the best thing I have right now is to be surrounded by amazing friends.
Tell us about your experience at Impact Lab? What are your roles and responsibilities?
I am responsible for scraping data for the charity database and for its optimization. Our main goal is to create a database where you can find all the government-registered charities. This will facilitate potential donations as donors can find the data of all the charities in the same place. We want to make it convenient for people who want to donate and by creating a database, might even increase the number of donations.
What is unique about the company that you work at?
What’s unique about FSI is that I have a really amazing supervisor who tries to make this experience as exciting as possible.
What are the major learnings that you gained from participating in Impact Lab? How has the experience helped your understanding of social impact?
From this Impact Lab experience, I learned communication and leadership skills, and I learned web scraping. I wasn’t as active before and my advisor asked me to communicate more frequently. And after a short time, I started to communicate more in our WhatsApp group so I think I just needed a little push. As for the leadership skills, we had two young interns and I was responsible for guiding them and telling them what to do from the beginning. So, I was able to practice these skills and I think I have learned a lot. Other than this, I also learned technical skills from different resources like documentation and YouTube tutorials, and also I had sufficient guidance from the advisor chosen by my instructor.
How has this experience benefited your personal growth? How will this experience benefit your future, in terms of your career and/or other endeavors?
Not only is this internship a good working experience, but it is also the first time ever that I had to report to a supervisor. I think it’s a good experience to be added to my personal portfolio and it was also my first professional experience working in a team. I was asked to lead new interns so the leadership and teamworking skills I gained will very much likely assist me in my professional life ahead. To be honest, I believe that I am a better person than I was after I joined the Impact Lab. I am more and more of a self-learning person now because this project demanded a lot of things that are very new to me. I think this is one of the most important skills a Computer Science student must carry because universities don’t teach you those skills which might be demanded by the future of work, and often we need to acquire these skills on our own.
How has the COVID-19 pandemic affected you?
To be honest, the pandemic hasn’t affected me that much, however, there’s a little messed up routine because of no face-to-face classes.
The pandemic has caused many unprecedented challenges for social impact organizations. From working at the company, how do you think the pandemic has affected the organization, its leaders, and its beneficiaries?
Because of the pandemic, communication might be an issue as it’s much more difficult to communicate on video calls, compared to face-to-face meetings. As everything is online, I am kind of tired of it. Moreover, I prefer human contacts through face-to-face meetings more.
If there is one thing you can do for the world right now, what would it be?
I would like to make people more tolerant. Because I come from a country full of intolerant people and this intolerance is damaging for my country. People don’t respect each other’s opinions and can’t tolerate anything that doesn’t happen according to their wills. This ranges from religion to politics. I want peace and for that we need tolerance. People should respect each others’ beliefs and shouldn’t force their own beliefs on others.
Would you recommend the Impact Lab to other students? Why?
Yes, to be honest, I think students from all fields should take the Impact Lab course before the end of their second year of U-life. This is because the third year is quite crucial for them to explore other internships and job experiences which are valuable additions to their resumes. By attending Impact Lab earlier, they can gain hands-on experience and guidance by working with experienced supervisors who will always be there to guide you along the way. Another thing is that we all want to be a better version of ourselves and to spread positivity. I think Impact Lab is an amazing opportunity for that as it gives you a chance to spread good vibes and make a social impact. Not to mention you will get 6 credits for it as well.
