My Journey as Developer Student Clubs Lead (DSC Lead)
Purpose of writing this blog: Sharing my experience of Developer Student Clubs and tips on how to run DSC successfully in Universities
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I am always fond of community work, helping people, solving small-scale problems, and love the way how anyone can access technology and complete their daily tasks.
In this article I will be sharing: How I get selected for a DSC and What are the activities I did after I got selected as DSC Lead. I hope some of these activities will help you in your community as well. This is our Facebook page where we update all are activities, get in touch with us.
How I get selected for DSC?
One day, I had a discussion with my friends about Google Student Ambassador program and thinking if something will be available for us as well, which can give us the power to be a leader. After some days, my mentor (Aaditya Maheshwari)called me and asked if he can submit my name for the DSC application. It was exciting for me but before that, I had to perform some task given in the application. I had to make a 60 secs video on What I will do if I become a Lead,(my submission). We are 5 students who had submitted the application and out of those 2 of us get selected for next hangout interview round(27th Aug 2017).
I got a bit of nervousness before I got a call, and when I had a call they asked about me what is my experience, what sort of projects I was doing, and what and how I was going to run this club in my University. I answered them confidently and got the selection mail (30th Aug 2017)
What are the activities I did after I got selected
We got the details of our on-boarding activities. Activities are like helping people who don’t use the internet and help them to understand how they can harness the power of mobile phones and make their life easier. I had taken a small session for bus manager, gardener, bus conductor, an electrician of our college (5th Sep 2017 -Teachers Day). Moreover, I also discuss same with people living in my neighbourhood and in mutual connections.
My Achievement: People learned how to use Whats App, Google Duo, Google Maps, YouTube and Google Search. When I see those people today, they were able to use their mobile and Internet to complete their daily tasks
We had to organise a Pilot workshop on Android Application Development. DSC crew has organised office hours sessions for all Leads where we can discuss about management, leadership and also technical related queries. I had organised 5 pilot workshops at 5 different places to help students understand what DSC is and how they can start with Android Application Development with us. I had organised at my college along with 3 nearby colleges and 1 at local GDG chapter.
Also introducing people with the latest tech like Augmented Reality/Virtual Reality, Cardboard, Humanoid etc.
Now, we have to organise regular workshops which is a typical tasks in terms of time management. Lead is allowed to have the core team of 2–4 students who can help in activities. I had organised a 7 days workshop at 4 different colleges each, for the students who knows Java. That was the first time in my college where a student is teaching something to his peers. (Happy Moment) Attendees come up with some exciting apps, mostly on solving some local problems. Sometimes, it’s not possible to organise sessions or workshops in campus so we shifted the regular sessions and workshops at our home and public places.
Opportunity
Meanwhile, all the DSC Leads got the invitation for Google Developers Day, Bangalore 2017 (1–2nd December). This is the first time when all the DSC Leads meet. Before getting the event confirmation code from DSC, I also got the confirmation code from Certification Alumni (Google Associate Android Developer Certification) and I attend the event as Certification alumni. DSC gave us a chance to be a Teaching Assistant(TA) with Googlers. This is the best moment where I got a chance to share room with a Googler, teaching over hundreds of people.
Coming back to hometown, motivates me to do more work and I start increasing awareness about the club in our city. We got a chance to be outreach partner for JoshTalks event. AppAchhi had taken my interview for a brief understanding about DSC.
We had started a series of a single day session in all nearby 5 colleges on Intro to DSC and other programs by Google like Certifications, GSoC, Udacity Scholarships etc. By the time, the results of Udacity Scholarships has announced and over 30–40 students from our city got selected, and from which some of them are currently in phase 2 of scholarships. The student getting Google Certification of Associate Android Developer. One of my classmates has also completed Udacity Machine Learning Nanodegree.
Bringing tech culture in my city is what I wish to see. Students (GitHub) start making their apps public and run campaigns to get feedback and understand how things work on a bigger picture. Season of Worlds Biggest Hackathon (Smart India Hackathon) came back. Students had applied for it and their ideas got selected for the final round where they had to go to the specific nodal center across India and had to develop the prototype in 32 hours. One of the teams from our college BotLabs.in, got 1st runner-up position and won prize money of 10 Lakh rupees. By seeing such activities going around, junior students also started participating in our activities and start getting selected for hackathons and got the exposure by visiting different colleges in India.
Recently, students applied for the SSEP Rajasthan program, 9 students get selected from our college over 18k applications. They will be visiting California for 2 weeks sponsored by Rajasthan Government. (Talk with Student)
We start focusing on Local Businesses, so the students who are learning under DSC can apply their knowledge and develop solutions for their businesses.
We first target a Gym, nearby our home which is a local gym and 30–40 people come there for exercise but the only trainer is available. This is a difficult job for a trainer. So we come up with a simple solution called GymBuddy(PlayStore). Next, we have Garment Wholesaler who wants to increase his market in retail and manage stocks. A group of students whom mother worked as a teacher in school they developed an app called math mania(PlayStore).
Some of the business problems are different where they require you to connections, approaches, ideas and there also we played a role as a mentor or partners (Garima’s Herbal Care, Udaipur Vibes, BurhanH films, Bharat Classes, Khushbu Agency, Ashok Ji k Sharbat etc.) Applied CS Skill and Digital Unlocked course played a major role here.
The community grows when people grow. We have to cover more people in all different areas of interest. So, we host the first ever Local Guide Meetup (Photo Walk) in our city.
We start getting the impact of our work when we got some big news like 4 students get an internship at EON Reality as a Pre Sales Engineer in Delhi. Some students start freelancing, getting an internship opportunity from various organizations. One of our mates get placed at Ahmadabad as a Web Developer, others as an associate engineer, content writer, Android Developers and some started their startups. And the big one is student get invited to California for 2 weeks.
Chance to Attend Google I/O
The best opportunity one Engineering Student can get in his life is to be at Google I/O and meet the Googlers. I got the mail around 2:30 AM saying that “Here is your Google I/O attendee confirmation code, register to confirm” and I was thunderstruck at midnight. I fill up the details and register as soon as I could. But the thing is, I didn’t have a Visa and never went outside India.
My first flight was when Google selected me as Android Facilitator under Applied CS with Android Program and that was the first time when I went outside my Rajasthan.
I applied for my visa, got the date for Bio-metrics at Delhi office and Chennai for a visa interview. My visa gets rejected by sec-14b, I went back to my city with all the hopes down. My semester exams start but I again apply for the visa and this time I had to go under some steps.
Going to college -> writing my semester exam -> go to nearby airport -> went to Chennai -> done Bio-metrics -> back to Udaipur -> study for exam -> go to college -> write exam -> nearby airport -> Chennai -> Got the Visa Interview -> back to Udaipur -> study and write exam.
This process makes me attend Google I/O 2018. The best thing I learned from I/O is the dedication and the passion people have from across the globe towards technology and solving problems. I would love to attend the Google I/O 2019 with more enthusiasm and would like to help other students as well to experience I/O in a much better way.
Conclusion
What I learned from this journey is; no matter in which college you are or in which ecosystem you are living, if a single person tries to bring some change first by growing himself than it will help others to join and develop the new ecosystem. I am always ready to help students to set up and run successful communities in their campuses.
I can see the future of DSC on a big picture where all other students across the globe are connecting and solving problems to make this world a better place to live.
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