Reflections on Hiring Season and the Launch of Summer Session
By Q McEachern, Senior Programs Manager
Honestly, these past six months of the fellows program have been exhilarating and challenging, fulfilling and hopefully extremely impactful to every single fellow, facilitator, staff member, community member, alumni, everyone who has been able to engage with this hiring season programming.
It's been a journey because we started all the way back in October with our welcome webinar and jumped directly into programming that we heard from students of years past and current fellows was impactful.
We leaned deeper into behavioral and technical interview support, hosted by alumni Bryan Rivera.
We connected with S&P Global for a career development workshop for students.
Our own Community Engagement Manager Oscar Montiel dove deeper into the importance of mentorship, and we dove deeper into the intersections of racial equity and tech.
Now feels like such an impactful moment in time for us, and I'm grateful that you joined us on the ride.
I also think that in this new year of 2025, these past few months of programming and community building have felt different, particularly with the ever changing landscapes of our country. Community & advocacy continue to be priorities for us, in conjunction with that of workforce development because we know that's a big ask from all of our students, alumni, and community members. In that, we connected with Gavin Bell, an Indigenous facilitator with backgrounds in career coaching through the lens of racial equity and wellness. He worked with fellows on the concept of the medicine wheel, including wellness within ourselves, wellness as we advocate, and wellness as we’re navigating one of most difficult job/internship markets of our lifetimes.
He also taught us about the concept of moving like a hawk, being methodical and intentional with our movements, and then striking at the right time with the right intentionality.
You see, I think that this hiring season has been so directly transformative for us, and we've been able to give and receive feedback with one another in ways that have really only helped all of us get better.
Now we are here, in celebration at the end of hiring season, and some of us will be continuing on into summer programming where we will have our in person Summer Summit in Detroit! We’ll also hold our first ever hackathon alongside community building opportunities within our summer pods and our mentors.
For some, the end of hiring season marks the end of the Fellows Program, and we welcome those folks into our Alumni community, forever Fellows. Others are continuing with us into the summer program. We are grateful for all the time and energy that everyone has given to the program: we’ve seen Fellows build lasting relationships with other Black and Latinx early career technologists, establish professional connections, and many are moving into the summer jumping into internships and TA opportunities. Our Fellows are really taking incredible next steps as they enter the industry.
What feels most hopeful and powerful to me is the way that our Fellows will take what they’ve learned along the way: through their next steps, into their internships and careers. We've dove deep into racial equity advocacy tenets of social justice.
We know the tech industry was not built for us, and it continues to move in a way that is adversarial to Black and Brown folks in this country and globally. As our Fellows transition into their careers, they take their advocacy skills with them. As hiring season ends and some of our Fellows join our Alumni community, our capacity to alter the landscape of tech grows. Our work doesn’t end here because our fellows become advocates for their peers, themselves, and for change inside of tech companies.
I am filled with hope for change in the industry because our Fellows take their racial equity advocacy skills with them. As a community, we continue the fight, we continue to learn and grow, and together, we continue to be racial equity advocates.