OVERVIEW:

The Collab Lab is a non profit organization that helps early career developers and, in particular, people in under-represented groups in tech, gain experience they need to break into tech. To achieve that, over the course of 8 weeks a team of 4 junior developers work collaboratively on a software project, under the guidance of volunteer mentors. The goal is for them to gain hands-on experience by working in a professional setting with code reviews, pair programming sessions, weekly meetings and retro sessions.

The project is a “smart” shopping list that learns your behavior over time and prioritizes the things that you are going to need and reminds you to buy them. The developers had to work both on the functionality of the application and the appearance of it. Check out the deployed app
here and the repository here!

Key Technologies and Tools:

• HTML/CSS/JavaScript
• UI Library: React
• Hosting & Database: Firebase
• UI Styling: Bootstrap

The Team

Collabies

• Alexandria D'Antonio
• Ashelle Cancio
• Randall Bustamante
• Sarah Jenkins

Mentors

• DJ Taylor
• Matthew Foley
• Volha Hancharova - Lead Mentor

Day in Life of a Collabie

The team of developers (called Collabies) met with the team of Mentors each Saturday for eight weeks, for a one hour "Weekly Sync" call on Zoom. The first order of business during the call was for the Collabies to demonstrate the previous week's work with technical details, and then switching gears to either a Retrospective or a "Learning Module". In Retrospectives, both Collabies and Mentors took time to both celebrate and reflect on their prior two weeks experiences, being sure to document next steps. Learning Modules included talks delivered by Mentors on topics like Pair Programming, Source Control (Git), Communication for Developers, and Accessibility. Lastly during these calls, the Mentors would present the following week's work, managed as issues in GitHub. The Collabies would select their GitHub issues for the week, and get started!

Between Weekly Syncs, the Collabies self-organized for pair programming sessions and technical research, and sometimes divided up work for async tasks. Collabies made a good habit of starting Draft PRs early in their process, so that the Mentors and Peers could easily collaborate with them if they got stuck, or contribute suggestions along the way. Around the middle of the week, each pair of Collabies performed code review on the other pair's PR, and following that, the Mentors made their own code reviews. Once all was approved, the Collabies would SHIP IT, ready to present in the Weekly Sync!

In the 7th and 8th weeks, the routine changed - rather than the Mentors managing the process, the Collabies took over. At this point, the functional requirements were substantially completed, and the Collabies focused on the appearance of the application. They were given a goal of the app having a professional appearance, and they managed the entire process for the final two weeks, driving the project to completion! They created their own acceptance criteria, delegated their own work, did pair programming when necessary, and leaned on each other and the Mentors when they got stuck. They practiced some Product Management skills by managing feature priorities, and they also gained some experience of working in a team with velocity, keeping tabs on each other's work and avoiding merge conflicts.

A Few Words from the Collabies

From Ashelle Cancio

My experience with The Collab Lab was fantastic. The mentors were always helpful and genuinely cared about our success. They shared their own experiences as developers, which was inspiring, and I learned a lot when pair-programming with the other participants. Through the program, I got the hang of the Agile workflow and became familiar with using a Kanban board to manage our weekly issues. While I knew basic Git commands, we encountered some merge conflicts, which was actually helpful because this forced me to learn new commands. I also realized the importance of code reviews. Overall, I am more confident in my coding abilities and feel prepared to review other developers' code in future projects. I am grateful for the experience and the knowledge gained from the mentors and fellow collabies!

From Randall Bustamante

Working with the mentors and collabies on our shopping list app was the most rewarding experience I've had with coding thus far. Bootcamp was stressful and overwhelming. Despite it being in person, I didn't quite get the support I needed. The Collab Lab set this mentorship up perfectly! The mentors guided us perfectly. They didn't solve our problems, but they empowered us to find resources and succeed thanks to our own efforts. I learned A TON of knowledge that solidified skills I felt shaky on. I met amazing humans who gave their time to help others. I will forever be grateful for this experience. Thank you, DJ Taylor, Volha Hancharova and Matthew Foley. To my fellow collabies, huge thanks to Alexandria D'Antonio, Ashelle Cancio, and Sarah Jenkins for your collaboration and leadership! And a final shout out to Alex Morton for watching over us to make sure all was good and healthy.

From Alexandria D'Antonio

Being a part of this cohort was a transformative experience. Imposter syndrome was a huge hurdle I faced starting my journey as a software engineer. However, being a part of The Collab Lab was the clicking piece for me that confirmed I belong on this path. The experiences I've gained prior as a bootcamp graduate have all been short-term projects. Working with this amazing team for the last eight weeks showed me the collaborative dynamic of being in this kind of role. I loved it. I learned and applied new technical communication skills in writing pull requests, code reviews, and giving and receiving feedback. While having a lot of fun working with Sarah, Randall, and Ashelle, I also learned a lot from the different perspectives of my fellow Collabies. Instrumental to our success was the consistent support and guidance of our mentors Volha, Matt, and DJ. Each week, we were using new technical and documenting methods thanks to the mentors' thoughtful comments and recommendations. As a Collabie, I was able to build confidence in myself week by week during this program and will forever be thankful for this opportunity!

Conclusion

To wrap things up, everyone enjoyed the experience and there were all sorts of valuable learnings. The developers worked diligently to deliver a high quality application. Any organization would be lucky to have any of these developers on their team!

If you are an early-career developer, the application for the next cohort is ongoing and this is a huge opportunity. Apply!!!