Sometimes I wonder about how the whole career choosing standard works. Generally, every 18-year-old entering college has to pick a major that will define so much about their career and their future and that’s just normal! I had no idea what I wanted to do when I was 18. I’m certainly not using anything specific to my first degree now. But when considering this program is meant for people changing careers, I really feel we have a leg up.

First of all, just generally being a bit older than most new graduates and interns gives us a big advantage. Along with the extra years we have comes more maturity and general life experience. Also, at least for me, I am so much more confident now than I was the first time around. I think that gives a huge boost when it comes to performing at an internship or even during interviews. In a lot of situations, I am more confident speaking my mind and explaining the things that I am working on or having trouble with. I don’t think that would be the same for 19-year-old me.

In a similar vein, I think coming from a non-STEM background helps when it comes to this. My first degree was in Political Science, which the only skills I really keep from that are in reading, writing, and speaking. I feel that a lot of engineering students can easily skip over these skills as they aren’t nearly as focused on in a STEM degree and I think that’s an oversight. At my internship this summer with Amazon, my manager said multiple times that one of the areas that I really excelled in was communication. Without my first degree, I don’t think I would have had the same experience, and I also honestly feel like getting that internship would have been a lot harder.

All this to say, even though a lot of us here might not be in a position again where we will be using the skills and information specific to our first degrees, there are probably still a lot of things that we can take from them and internalize to help us in this new career path. And if I had chosen Computer Science at 18, I don’t know that I would be as successful as I am now.