How My First Internship at Millennial Software Helped Me Grow
As summer winds down and the days begin to cool as I make preparations to move into my dorm for the autumn semester, I find myself reflecting on my first internship experience that is coming to a close all too soon…
Starting Out
I began my internship with Millennial Software in May of 2024. Since then, the company has provided me with an amazing opportunity to learn about software engineering in practice. In the beginning, I was unsure of myself. With just one year of university courses, I thought to myself, “What value would I be able to bring to the team?” Gratefully, with the guidance of my wonderful Millennial mentors and the support of my fellow interns, I soon found myself not only staying afloat, but thriving at work. Between the excitement of the projects and all that there was to learn about, I have truly looked forward to starting work each morning.
SDA TAP Lab
When I came on board, I was assigned to the team’s SDA TAP Lab project. For context, Millennial Software was selected to help the SDA TAP Lab develop an AI-powered tool to predict satellite maneuvers before they happen. This enables better identification of anomalies in observed behavior to maintain awareness of assets in orbit. My task on the team was to create a data aggregator that could retrieve maneuvers and state vectors recorded by our cohort colleague, ExoAnalytics, for use as training data for our AI model.
At first, this prospect seemed overwhelming. I had never worked with satellite data, never interacted with the Unified Data Library API, and I had never even used GitLab for project development before. To create a successful product, I knew I would need to learn a lot. So that’s exactly what I did. I spent hours researching and teaching myself the various concepts that I needed for the project. My coworkers and mentors were infinitely supportive in this endeavor, but I knew that I couldn’t solely rely on their help. I had to learn for myself and apply what I learned to my work. This wasn’t the classroom I was used to with instructors slowly walking through every step of the process–this was the real world and my internship assignment was both dynamic and challenging. In the end, the experience motivated me to push myself past my previous limits and grow as a software engineer.
What I’ve Learned
My time at Millennial Software has taught me that while academics are important, they can only take you so far. The software field is constantly evolving and every organization operates within its own niche with specific, relevant knowledge. In one job, you may need to know about satellites and orbits. In others, you may need to know about pathogen identification or mechanical stress and tensile strength. To succeed, you need to be able to learn quickly and independently, and to sort through your findings for what’s immediately relevant to your work. Millennial Software gave me the experience that my college education alone lacked. With my new perspective and learnings, I’m excited to move forward in my education and, hopefully, return to Millennial Software for another internship next summer.
