The Aardvark Monthly – Big Idea Gap Year Special Edition

In this Special Edition of The Aardvark Monthly, we share with you some of the exciting things happening on the Big Idea Gap Year! And with March being International Women’s Month, we are focusing on some of our female Big Idea students making a big impact in the tech scene!

My name is Abby Miller, and I am currently completing a software development internship at a company called Poloriz. Their mission is to improve users’ eCommerce shopping experience through personalized UX on mobile devices. I spend internship days coding, utilizing a platform called Angular, along with three front-end programming languages: TypeScript, HTML, and SCSS.

My internship has been an incredible opportunity for me to improve upon my problem-solving, analytical, and critical thinking skills. Having minimal experience with Angular and only some experience with these programming languages made this internship quite a challenge at first. Nonetheless, after a significant amount of reading, practicing, and perseverance, I’ve learned a great deal and achieved significant progress. And, as I move to the server-side and begin to incorporate databases, I look forward to the challenges that lie ahead.

For being a field dominated by men and known for its intensity and rigor, computer science was a field that daunted me. But when I realized that there is so much more to computer science—that it’s about problem solving and building things to make the world a better place—I knew that this was a field for me.

Away from Office:

at Big Idea Gap Year @ Aardvark Israel, we like to not only code but also give back to our community. This month, some of our students joined Masa Israel Journey and other gap year programs to clean up after the devastating oil spill that is considered one the most severe ecological disasters that has ever happened in Israel’s history.

Expanding Her Horizons and Experience in Israel

In her first semester on Big Idea Gap Year, Jaclyn Josephson learned computer coding in addition to her Aardvark Israel classes.

During her second semester, she’s been working on creating her own app, which will focus on mental health and offer users a platform where they can share their own experiences. She’s also interning at FairFly, a tech startup in Tel Aviv.
Read in Jaclyn’s own words why she would “300%” tell others to do a gap year program in Israel.

IMPACT MONTH

“When BIG IDEA Gap Year @ Aardvark Israel started back in September, I was really excited to learn about web development and expand my programming skills. I wanted to take away a new skill set that could help me in my future endeavours, as well as allow me to help others. After completing the coding course during the first semester and the Impact Month hackathon in January, I can happily say that I’ve met my goals.”

We believe that learning takes place outside the classroom as much as inside. Each week, we take the students on an excursion allowing them to connect to Israel in a deep and meaningful way. These field trips include visits to nature reserves, historical sites, museums, a variety of communities and more.