WWCD Mentorship Program 3.0: Week 3

Going into Week 3, I was extremely hopeful of the vast amount of opportunities and expectations that awaited me to be explored. To say the least, they were all met by our amazing mentor Pallavi Bishnoi!

The agenda for this week was all about scholarships and how to approach them and grab them with the correct strategy and awareness.

We talked about a wide range of applications that we can fill right now or in the near future, which primarily included Google WomenTechmakers Scholarship (now known as Google Generation Scholarship), WE Sprint Scholarship, GHC’21, Google Udacity Scholarships, etc.

Our discussion was structured into two main divisions:

1. Application Period: Mostly, all the above scholarship programs mentioned encompass a detailed application procedure with essay questions revolving around the contribution to the technical community and how substantially someone fits the position. The key takeaway from this was the importance of building a story around your journey and always adding a personal honest touch to it. Always try to communicate to the reader the impact you created using numbers and statistics wherever possible (to increase reliability).
2. Post Application Period: Once the duration after the application process is over, the rest of the time should be devoted to practicing questions for clearing technical rounds and behavioral questions for final interview rounds. It is always advised to add a lot of proofs to your applications (GitHub link, etc.) so that the reader can know your ground and how extensively you have contributed to being considered for the scholarship.

Apart from the above scholarship opportunities, we also discussed the Open Source opportunities like GSoC, Outreachy, and GirlScript Summer of Code. The major understanding was built around the fact about the importance of the contribution period, the time investment required in the projects that are taken up, and how important it is to create a mark on the organization and/or mentors you are contributing for.

The tasks given to us were:

1. Filling out applications for the above-mentioned programs.
2. Looking into the applications for the Open-Source programs.
3. Preparing a sample draft containing the answers to the essay questions most frequently asked and getting them reviewed by our mentor.
4. Getting our profiles checked and collecting feedback.

Altogether, I believe Week-3 was a huge success in terms of assessing our position and being on the look-out for opportunities that come along! I am grateful to WWCD and my mentor Pallavi for their time and efforts every week to pull this off for us fellow women! :)