hackNY
hackNY
Background
hackNY is a non-profit dedicated to empowering the next generation of student technologists in New York City. Every year, about 20 fellows are chosen to be part of a class that lives in New York City, interns with local startups, and works on technical social good projects on the side. I was part of the hackNY class of 2019, and I stepped up to serve as Director of Admissions for the class of 2020.
Solution
I facilitated and created a review process for over 2,300 applications, conducted lots of technical and behavioral interviews, and ended up admitting a class of 24 wonderful fellows. This was a really interesting job of mine, simply because it wasn't technical, and the daunting task of choosing a cool, unique class from such an intimidatingly large pool wasn't one that anyone could tell me how to do. I had to develop fair admissions policies, learn how to holistically assess people while minimizing bias, and overall, just learn how to organize complex situations with little/no background. I regularly had to fix urgent, client-facing incidents on the fly, and successfully worked with my team of over 50 volunteers to achieve our desired goal, which directly taught me more about ownership and leadership than any other job of mine.