Tag Archives: Google Developer Student Clubs

Solution Challenge 2024 – Using Google Technology to Address UN Sustainable Development Goals

Posted by Rachel Francois, Global Program Manager, Google Developer Student Clubs

Google Developer Student Clubs celebrates 5 years of innovative solutions built by university students


This year marks the 5-year anniversary of the Google Developer Student Clubs Solution Challenge! For the past five years, the Solution Challenge has invited university students to use Google technologies to develop solutions for real-world problems.

Since 2019:

  • Over 110+ countries have participated
  • Over 4,000+ projects have been submitted
  • Over 1,000+ chapters have participated

The project solutions address one or more of the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals, which aim to end poverty, ensure prosperity, and protect the planet by 2030. The goals were agreed upon by all 193 United Nations Member States in 2015.

If you have an idea for how you could use Android, Firebase, TensorFlow, Google Cloud, Flutter, or another Google product to promote employment for all, economic growth, and climate action, enter the 2024 GDSC Solution Challenge and share your ideas!

Solution Challenge prizes

Check out the many great prizes you can win by participating:

  • Top 100 teams receive branded swag, a certificate, and personalized mentorship from Google and experts to help further their solution ideas.
  • Final 10 teams receive a swag box, additional mentorship, and the opportunity to showcase their project solutions to Google teams and developers worldwide during the virtual 2024 Solution Challenge Demo Day, live on YouTube. Additional cash prize of $1,000 per student. Winnings for each qualifying team will not exceed $4,000.
  • Winning 3 teams receive a swag box, and each individual receives a cash prize of $3,000 and a feature on the Google Developers Blog. Winnings for each qualifying team will not exceed $12,000.

Joining the Solution Challenge

To join the Solution Challenge and get started on your project:

Google resources for Solution Challenge participants

Google supports Solution Challenge participants with resources to build strong projects, including:

  • Create a demo video and submit your project by February 22, 2024
  • Live online Q&A sessions
  • Mentorship from Googlers, Google Developer Experts, and the Google Developer Student Club community
  • Curated codelabs designed by Google for Developers
  • Access to Design Sprint guidelines developed by Google Ventures

and so much more!

Winner announcement dates

Once all projects are submitted, our panel of judges will evaluate and score each submission using specific criteria. After that, winners will be announced in three rounds:

  • Round 1 (April): Top 100 teams will be announced.
  • Round 2 (May): Final 10 teams will be announced.
  • Round 3 (June): The Winning 3 grand prize teams will be announced live on YouTube during the 2024 Solution Challenge Demo Day.

We're looking forward to seeing the solutions you create when you combine your enthusiasm for building a better world, coding skills, and help from Google technologies.

Learn more and sign up for the 2024 Solution Challenge here.

Meet the student leaders building apps using Google technology

Posted by Kübra Zengin, North America GDSC Regional Lead

Serving as a Google Developer Student Clubs (GDSC) Lead at the university level builds technical skills and leadership skills that serve alumni well in their post-graduate careers. Four GDSC Alumni Leads from universities in Canada and the U.S. have gone on to meaningful careers in the tech industry, and share their experiences.

Image of Daniel Shirvani (right) with Ayman Bolad (left)at a Google Developer Students event

Daniel Shirvani: The Next Frontier in Patient Data

Daniel Shirvani graduated from the University of British Columbia (UBC) in Vancouver, Canada, in 2023, with a Bachelor’s of Science in Pharmacology, and will soon return to UBC for medical school. He served as Google Developer Student Clubs (GDSC) Lead and founding team member. He also launched his own software company, Leftindust Systems, in 2019, to experiment with creating small-scale electronic medical record software (EMR) for the open source community. This project is now closed.

“I built a startup to rethink the use of medical software,” he says.

As a summer student volunteer at a Vancouver-area heart clinic, Shirvani was tasked with indexing hundreds of medical records, who had specific blood glucose HBA1C levels and factors related to kidney disease, to see who would be eligible for the new cardiac drug. However, the clinic’s medical records software didn’t have the capability to flag patients in the system, so the only way to register the hundreds of files on Shirvani’s final list would be to do so manually–and that was impossible, given the size of the list and the time remaining in his work term. He believed that the software should have been able to not only flag these patients, but also to automatically filter which patients met the criteria.

“Two to three hundred patients will not receive this life-saving drug because of this software,” Shirvani says. “My father is a patient who would have been eligible for this type of drug. His heart attack put things into perspective. There are families just like mine who will have the same experience that my father did, only because the software couldn’t keep up.”

Shirvani decided to combine his medical knowledge and programming skills to develop an electronic medical software, or EMR, that could store patient data numerically, instead of within paragraphs. This allows doctors to instantly analyze the data of patients, both at the individual and group-level. Doctors across North America took notice, including those from UBC, Stanford, UCLA, and elsewhere.

“During the North America Connect conference, a 2-day in-person event bringing together organizers and members across North America from the Google for Developers community programs including Google Developer Group, Women Techmakers, Google Developer Experts, and Google Developer Student Clubs, I met with many GDEs and Googlers, such as Kevin A. McGrail, who is now a personal mentor,” says Shirvani, who continues to look for other ways to make change in the healthcare community.

"When systems disappoint, we see not an end, but a new beginning. It’s in that space that we shape the future.


Image of Alexandra Cusell presenting at Carnegie Mellon University Swartz Center for Entrepreneurship

Alex Cussell: Becoming a tech entrepreneur

Alex Cussell graduated from the University of Central Florida in 2020, where she was a GDSC Lead her senior year. She says the experience inspired her to pursue her passion of becoming a tech entrepreneur.

“Leading a group of students with such differing backgrounds, addressing the world’s most pervasive problems, and loving every second of it taught me that I was meant to be a tech entrepreneur,” she says. “We were on a mission to save the lives of those involved in traffic accidents, when the world as we knew it came to a screeching halt due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

After her virtual graduation, Cussell moved to Silicon Valley and earned a Master’s in Technology Ventures from Carnegie Mellon University. She studied product management, venture capital, and startup law, with a vision of building a meaningful company. After getting engaged and receiving multiple gift cards as bridal shower gifts, Cussell found herself confused about each card’s amount and challenged trying to keep them organized.

She created the Jisell app, which features a universal gift card e-wallet, allowing users to digitize their gift cards. The app has had over five thousand dollars in gift cards uploaded to date and a partnership with the largest gift card distributor in the U.S. Jisell product manager Emily Robertson was Cussell’s roommate at the GDSC summit.

“Without Google Developer Student Clubs, I might never have realized how much I love problem-solving or technical leadership or known so much about the great tools offered by Google,” Cussell says. "Thank you to everyone who contributes to the GDSC experience; you have truly changed the lives of so many.”


Headshot of Angela Busheska, smiling

Angela Busheska: Founding a nonprofit to fight climate change

Angela Busheska is double majoring in electrical engineering and computer science, with a minor in mathematics, at Lafayette College in Easton, Pennsylvania, and anticipates graduating in 2025. A Google intern this summer and last summer, Busheska participated in Google’s Computer Science Research Mentorship Program from September 2021-January 2022, which supports the pursuit of computing research for students from historically marginalized groups through career mentorship, peer-to-peer networking, and building awareness about pathways within the field. Busheska investigated the computing processes across four different projects in the field of AI for Social Good.

During the pandemic, in 2020, Busheska founded EnRoute, a nonprofit to harness the power of everyday actions to fight climate change and break down the stigma that living sustainably is an expensive and challenging commitment. She also built a mobile app using Android and Flutter that helps users make simple daily transportation and shopping choices to reduce their carbon footprints. Since 2020, the app has guided thousands of users to reduce more than 100,000kg of CO2 emissions.

EnRoute honors Busheska’s aunt, who passed away when Busheska was 17. Busheska grew up in Skopje, in North Macedonia, one of the world’s most polluted cities.

“When I was 17 years old, Skopje’s dense air pollution led my aunt, who suffered from cardiovascular difficulties, to complete blood vessel damage, resulting in her swift passing,” says Busheska. “Inspired by my personal loss, I started researching the causes of the pollution.”

EnRoute has been featured on the Forbes 30 Under 30 Social Impact List and has been publicly recognized by Shawn Mendes, Prince William, One Young World, and the United Nations.


Headshot of Sapphira Ching, smiling

Sapphira Ching: Advancing Environmental, Social, and Government standards (ESG)

Sapphira Ching, a senior at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, spent her junior year as UPenn’s GDSC Lead, after joining GDSC her first year, leading social media for the club that spring and heading marketing and strategy her sophomore year. As a GDSC Lead, Sapphira expanded GDSC's campus membership and partnerships to reach an audience of over 2,000 students. In line with her passion for Environmental, Social, and Government standards (ESG) and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI), Sapphira built a leadership team from different areas of study, including engineering, business, law, medicine, and music.

Ching’s passions for ESG, technology, and business drive her choices, and she says, “I am eager to incorporate ESG into tech to bring people together using business acumen.”

The Wharton School appointed her as an inaugural undergraduate fellow at the Turner ESG Initiative, and she founded the Penn Innovation Network, an ESG innovation club. Her summer internships have focused on ESG; her 2021 summer internship at MSCI (formerly known as Morgan Stanley Capital International) centered on on ESG, and her 2022 summer internship was at Soros Fund Management, an ESG juggernaut in finance. She is also a NCAA Division I student-athlete and Olympic hopeful in sabre fencing.

“I attribute my growth in ESG, tech, and business to how GDSC has helped me since my first year of college,” Ching says.
Are you an Alumni or current GDSC Lead? You can join the Google Developer Student Clubs (GDSC) LinkedIn Group here. The group is a great place to share ideas and connect with current and former GDSC Leads.

Interested in joining a GDSC near you? Google Developer Student Clubs (GDSC) are university based community groups for students interested in Google developer technologies. Students from all undergraduate or graduate programs with an interest in growing as a developer are welcome. Learn more here.

Interested in becoming a GDSC Lead? GDSC Leads are responsible for starting and growing a Google Developer Student Club (GDSC) chapter at their university. GDSC Leads work with students to organize events, workshops, and projects. Learn more here.

Meet the students using Google technologies to address the UN’s sustainability goals around the globe

Posted by Rachel Francois, Global Program Manager, Google Developer Student Clubs


Every year, university students who are members of Google Developer Student Clubs around the world are invited to create innovative solutions for real-world problems as part of the Solution Challenge. Participating students use Google products and platforms like Android, Firebase, TensorFlow, Google Cloud, and Flutter to build solutions for one or more of the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals, which promote employment for all, economic growth, and climate action, to name a few. Agreed upon in 2015 by all 193 United Nations Member States, the goals aim to end poverty, ensure prosperity, and protect the planet by 2030.

On Demo Day, August 3, live on YouTube, the final 10 teams of the 2023 Solution Challenge will present their solutions to a panel of Google judges and a global audience of developers. These top 10 finalists were selected among the top 100 teams globally. During the live event, judges will review team projects, ask questions, and choose the top 3 grand prize winners!

Want to be part of this awesome event? RSVP here to tune into Demo Day, vote for the People’s Choice Award, and watch the action as it unfolds in real time.

In the meantime, learn more about our top 10 finalists and their amazing solutions.

The Top 10 Projects


Buzzbusters, Universidad Mayor de San Andres in Bolivia 🇧🇴

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 3: Good Health & Wellbeing, Goal 9: Industry, Innovation, & Infrastructure, Goal 11: Sustainable Cities, Goal 17: Partnerships

Buzzbusters is an early warning system designed to prevent epidemics of mosquito-borne diseases, like dengue, Zika, chikungunya, and yellow fever, by using Google Cloud monitoring technologies like Vertex AI, TensorFlow, Firebase, Flutter, Google Cloud Storage, Google Maps, and Google Colab.

Creators: Sergio Mauricio Nuñez, Saleth Jhoselin Mamani Huanca, Moises David Cisneros Laura, and Wendy Nayely Huayhua López


FarmX, Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria 🇳🇬

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 2: Zero Hunger, Goal 12: Responsible Consumption & Production, Goal 13: Climate Action

FarmX is an app that empowers farmers to decide which crops to plant, how to implement precision agriculture, and how to detect crop diseases, using TensorFlow, Flutter, Firebase, and Google Cloud.

Creators: Victor Olufemi, Oluwaseun Salako, Lekan Adesina, and Festus Idowu


Femunity, Vellore Institute of Technology in India 🇮🇳

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 3: Good Health & Wellbeing, Goal 4: Quality Education, Goal 5: Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment, Goal 10: Reduced Inequalities

Femunity is an innovative social media platform that empowers women by providing a safe and inclusive online space, using Flutter and Firebase.

Creators: Amritansh Sharma and Arin Yadav


HeadHome, Nanyang Technological University in Singapore 🇸🇬

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 3: Good Health & Wellbeing, Goal 11: Sustainable Cities

HeadHome is an app focused on tackling wandering by dementia patients, who can receive instructions from a dedicated watch or receive assistance from caregivers and volunteers. HeadHome is built on Google Cloud, using Cloud Run, Google Maps, and Firebase.

Creators: Chang Dao Zheng, Chay Hui Xiang, Ong Jing Xuan, and Marc Chern Di Yong


HearSitter, Yonsei University Seoul Campus in South Korea 🇰🇷

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 3: Good Health & Wellbeing

HearSitter is a mobile app that helps deaf parents with young children be aware of their children's needs, alerting parents to a baby’s cry or sudden noises. HearSitter was built using Flutter, Go Lang, Fiber, and AngularJS.

Creators: DongJae Kim, Juii Kim, HyoJeong Park, and YoungMin Jin


Project REMORA, University of Southampton in United Kingdom 🇬🇧

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 3: Good Health & Wellbeing, Goal 6: Clean Water & Sanitation

Project Remora is a smart water pollution tracking device that uses sensors to identify sources of water pollution, providing geo-tagged results that allow users to identify pollution sources using the concentration gradient. Project Remora was developed in the MIT App Inventor using Firebase, Realtime Database, and the Google Maps API.

Creators: Tong En Lim, Shao Qian Choong, Isaac Lim Rudd, and Aiman Haziq Bin Hairel Anuar


ReVita, Nazarbayev University in Kazakhstan 🇰🇿

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 3: Good Health & Wellbeing, Goal 9: Industry, Innovation, & Infrastructure

ReVita is a mobile app that addresses the mental and emotional challenges faced by organ transplant recipients, as well as the physical challenges of recovering from surgery. The ReVita app is built on GoLang, Flutter, Firebase, Google Fit, Google Maps API, Google Chat, Google Meet API, and Google Calendar API.

Creators: Dias Baimukhanov, Madiyar Moldabayev, Dinmukhamed Nuran, and Ansar Serikbayev


SlugLoop, University of California, Santa Cruz in United States 🇺🇸

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 4: Quality Education, Goal 11: Sustainable Cities, Goal 13: Climate Action

SlugLoop is a real-time bus tracking app that provides accurate route information for buses at the University of California Santa Cruz, allowing students to get to class on time, while reducing their carbon footprint. The SlugLoop app is built with React, Firebase, and Google Maps.

Creators: Bill Zhang, Alex Liu, Annie Liu, and Nicholas Szwed


Wonder, Korea University Seoul Campus in South Korea 🇰🇷

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 3: Good Health & Wellbeing

Wonder partners with local volunteer organizations to provide opportunities for users to engage in walking-based activities that contribute to their communities, like walking dogs for shelters or delivering meals to isolated seniors. Wonder is built with Flutter and utilizes TensorFlow, Google Maps, and Google Cloud.

Creators: Chanho Park, Keo Kim, Boyoung Kim, and Sukyung Baek


Wonder Reader, Binus University International in Indonesia 🇮🇩

UN Sustainable Goals Addressed: Goal 4: Quality Education, Goal 10: Reduced Inequalities

Wonder Reader is a 3D printed digital braille reader that helps visually impaired students learn by connecting wirelessly to a smartphone, allowing teachers to send questions to the device through Bluetooth and students to reply using the built-in braille keyboard. Wonder Reader was built using Google Cloud, Firebase, Flutter, and Google Text to Speech API.

Creators: Philipus Adriel Tandra, Aric Hernando, Jason Jeremy Wijadi, and Jason Christian Hailianto
Special thanks to our Google mentors and Google Developer Experts for supporting the students as they developed their fascinating projects.

Feeling inspired and ready to learn more about Google Developer Student Clubs? Find a club near you, and be sure to RSVP and tune in to the upcoming Solution Challenge Demo Day livestream on August 3 at 10:00am ET.

Developers Share How They Built Their Careers: From Machine Learning to Cloud

Posted by Lyanne Alfaro, DevRel Program Manager, Google Developer Studio

Google Developer Student Club Alums Reflect On Their Journey To Google Developer Experts

Developer Journey is a monthly series highlighting diverse and global developers sharing relatable challenges, opportunities, and wins in their journey. Every month, we will spotlight developers around the world, the Google tools they leverage, and the kind of products they are building.

This month, we spoke with several Google Developer Experts to learn more about their path from being Google Developer Student Clubs leads to connoisseurs of their craft.

Suvaditya Mukherjee

Headshot of Suvaditya Mukherjee smiling
Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Google Developer Expert, Machine Learning
Google Summer of Code Org Admin + ML Research Engineer Intern at Ivy
Research Intern at IIIT-Hyderabad

What are some key skills and knowledge you gained as a Google Developer Student Clubs Lead that helped you excel in your role as a Google Developer Expert?

Every day I spent as a lead was a learning experience, but what stood out to me was the holistic learning opportunities that the program brought. For example, as someone specializing in AI, I never found a need to learn Web Development until I had to help audit and create complex web apps for hosting competitions. Additionally, I learned how to absorb newer technical skills as quickly as possible, which proved to be incredibly valuable over time. I also learned the importance of soft skills, which helped me communicate better with my community. As an expert, it’s important to steward your community, and the leadership skills imparted by the program helped me build a deeper understanding of communication, logistics, and team-building.

What has been the impact of being part of the Google Developer Student Clubs community on your personal and professional growth?

As a Google Developer Student Clubs (GDSC) Lead, I benefited from participating in networking opportunities with like-minded folks and potential mentors who helped immensely in my journey. They helped shape my technical skills, and improve my soft skills. I also had the opportunity to speak in front of large crowds, develop content, manage teams, and closely understand what makes a community tick. As a GDE, it becomes important to have a pulse on the community's needs and requirements. The GDSC Program taught me how to measure these metrics at a grassroots level. I have had the privilege of working with the most skilled, dedicated, professional – and most importantly – humble folks as part of the GDSC Community. The program allowed me the privilege of communicating and building friendships with awesome people over time.

What Google tools have you used to build?

I have used quite a few Google tools in different projects and endeavors, including but not limited to Firebase, Flutter, and Android for hackathons. I have also made use of the Google Cloud Platform to develop and host scalable backend infrastructures during projects and internships in different places. But my most used tool is TensorFlow.

Which tool has been your favorite? Why?

As an ML Practitioner, TensorFlow and Keras have been a boon to simplify days of work into potentially hours or even minutes. The power it delivers to end-users in the most open and democratic way possible while constantly innovating for newer advances is something I have always appreciated. One of the biggest reasons I love Keras has to be the awesome community around it that welcomes everyone with open arms.

Tell us about something you've built in the past using Google tools.

I have hacked around a few projects over time. The most notable among them was an application I personally call TranscribeMate. Imagine you’re in an ongoing lecture and the professor is going quicker than usual, hindering your ability to take notes. TranscribeMate (built with Flutter, Firebase, and MLKit) allows you to use OCR technology to transcribe notes from simple photos of the classroom blackboard, allow newer annotations as a note-taking application, and save them for later use. This was an application I developed for a college course- but I ended up tweaking it a bit more and making use of it on my personal device as well for more general tasks too.

What will you create with Google Bard?

I have been using Bard for a while now; it has a permanent home on my browser. Bard helps me with random questions I have, and Python-related problems. Bard has helped me find solutions in seconds, compared to hours of work when done through traditional search methods. I have been using Bard's help on several projects I have been working on within my research, in projects at Ivy, and the Keras Team. Stay tuned for what comes next!

What advice would you give someone starting in their developer journey?

Seek new experiences to learn. No one can learn by working within a narrow niche. Having a working knowledge of different technologies at once allows you to have a diverse and multi-faceted approach to problem-solving. Optimizations in your systems become far more apparent, and you slowly end up learning how to write better code and design scalable systems with ease. Lastly, find a community. Find like-minded folks, talk to them, share notes on what you're building, and if you find yourself too shy to do so, then try anyway. Start by just showing up for one event near you. Then make it two. Then ask a question. The power of collaborative learning is immeasurable.

Veronica Putri Anggraini

Headshot of Veronica Putri Anggraini, smiling
Jakarta, Indonesia
Google Developer Expert, Android
GDSC Semarang State Polytechnic Lead Alumni (2017)
Google Developer Group
Women Techmakers Ambassador
Software Engineer Android, @ eWIDEPLUS

What are some key skills and knowledge you gained as a Google Developer Student Clubs Lead that helped you excel in your role as a Google Developer Expert?

Through GDSC, I learn a lot about Android technology, practice building Android projects, and do workshops for our members every week. This process improves my technical, writing, problem solving and public speaking skills at the same time. I started presenting as a student with a small group workshop of 5-10 people and grew to speaking in front of 1,000 people. This was also one of the necessary criteria to become a GDE.

Can you share some insights on the impact of being part of the Google Developer Student Clubs community on your personal and professional growth?

Exploring different resources while I was a student helped me develop sample app portfolios. I feel like I actually started my professional career as a curriculum developer and trainer for mobile development. I got an offer when I was a speaker at a tech event that discussed Android technology through the GDSC program. In fact, the CEO immediately offered the position after the event ended.

What Google tools have you used to build?

I have a lot of exploration with Jetpack Compose. I currently work closely with the CameraX, AndroidX Library, Google Analytics and Maps API.

Which tool has been your favorite? Why?

CameraX is one of my favorites, because it automatically manages camera resources and avoids unnecessary background work, so I got better performance.

Tell us about something you've built in the past using Google tools.

At my current company, we build a digital bank app product natively. This allows users to use Liveness as a verified onboarding process, QRPay, personalize promo campaigns, and other financial services that we build using Google tools.

What advice would you give someone starting in their developer journey?

Gain experience in dealing with issues in the stack that serve as a focus. Be consistent in learning, and don't give up easily when stuck. In other words, be the person that says: "Challenge Accepted".

You should know that learning together is more fun than learning alone, so join the community and learn everything you need and extend your network.

Anubhav Singh

Headshot of Anubhav Singh, smiling
Prayagraj, India
Google Developer Expert, Firebase
GDSC NSEC Kolkata Lead Alumni (2019-20)
GDG Cloud Kolkata Organizer & TFUG Kolkata Co-Organizer
Co-founder, Dynopii

What are some key skills and knowledge you gained as a Google Developer Student Clubs Lead that helped you excel in your role as a Google Developer Expert?

A major part of being a Google Developer Student Clubs Lead was to enable growth for those around me by learning together. I would often find myself guiding club members on various fronts – sometimes by taking knowledge-sharing sessions on technical topics, sometimes by diving deep into their projects’ code to help them overcome challenges they were facing and sometimes creating videos or written content for them to be able to follow along later.

Through partaking in these activities, I learned public speaking skills, mentoring, and how to be helpful to others experiencing roadblocks. These skills have proved important in my role as a Google Developer Expert.

What has been the impact of being part of the Google Developer Student Clubs community on your personal and professional growth?

Being a GDSC Lead helped me further steer teams with the same passion I have for building communities. As a GDSC Lead, you get to connect with a lot of amazing people. The community itself is highly diverse and vibrant. When I was organizing a workshop for the club during my time as a GDSC Lead, I was fortunate to meet two individuals who later became the co-founders of my startup. In that same club, three of our members became Google Developer Experts in the fields of their interest. Thus, being a GDSC Lead has had a very positive impact on both my professional and personal growth.

What Google tools have you used to build?

I’ve been working in the software development field for almost 12 years now and have used several Google tools over the years, including some that no longer exist. Some of the currently available tools that I most often work with are:

  1. Google Cloud Platform: Cloud Run, Cloud Functions, Cloud Firestore, Cloud Workflows, GKE, GCE, App Engine, Vertex AI and other AI based products, etc.
  2. Google Postmaster Tools, Search Console Tools, Analytics, Pagespeed Insights
  3. TensorFlow, Keras
  4. Google Maps API
  5. Firebase
  6. reCaptcha

Which tool has been your favorite? Why?

Firebase, hands down. As someone who loves building solutions that are useful to people, Firebase has been my go-to tool for prototyping solutions and MVPs rapidly. I’ve used it to build some simple tools which have been used by thousands of people over the years - all hosted for free and delivered with blazing speed! Even today, during my sessions as a GDE, I always use Firebase to build the UI part of the demo applications I present during the talk.

Tell us about something you've built in the past using Google tools.

I built Fireshort - a URL shortener solution running purely on Firebase. This project is completely open source and has been used by several companies as a base for their in-house URL shortening needs. I’ve been working on the next version of this project at Linkborg.

I’ve also built several real-time updating monitoring products using Firebase and Pub/Sub, mostly for enterprise clients.

As a proof of concept, I also built KolPay, which is a completely event-driven clone of EasyCard - RFID based payment wallet using Firebase, Pub/Sub, Cloud Firestore and Cloud Functions, along with hardware components like Raspberry Pi, RFID Reader/Card.

What will you create with Google Bard?

Building with Google Bard is an exciting prospect. It will be fun to no longer have to write the repetitive parts of code which I need whenever I am setting up a new project or a module within an existing project. Since I spend a lot of my day coding, I will be very happy to automate parts of it and having an AI do that would be amazing!

What advice would you give someone starting in their developer journey?

Starting a developer journey can be a daunting prospect - everyone’s talking about AI and everyone wants to build the next viral thing. If you are new to this field, step back, relax and start building a solution to any problem that has irked you for a long time. While you’re at it - read a lot of tech blogs about solving that problem, become a part of developer communities, either virtual or in person, and meet people who will share their insights about building similar products.

Kartik Derasari

Headshot of Kartik Derasari, smiling
Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India
Google Developer Expert, Google Cloud
GDSC Silver Oak University Lead Alumni (2020-2021)
Google Developers Group Cloud Organizer
Full-Stack Engineer at Persistent

What are some key skills and knowledge you gained as a Google Developer Student Clubs Lead that helped you excel in your role as a Google Developer Expert?

As a GDSC Lead, I’ve had the opportunity to collaborate with Googlers, Google Developer Experts, and Google Developer Groups Community Leads on various projects which helped me explore different technologies and choose what’s best for me. Knowledge sharing and public speaking is what I learned from the Google Developer Experts. Since then, I started my journey as a Technical Speaker where I share my learnings on Machine Learning & TensorFlow, Web, Firebase, and Google Cloud. I also had the opportunity to share my learnings across conferences like DevFest, Google Cloud Community Days, and GDSC WOW. These are some of the learnings that really helped me shape as a Google Developer Expert and excel in my journey.

Can you share some insights on the impact of being part of the Google Developer Student Clubs community on your personal and professional growth?

Being a GDSC Lead created a positive impact in my personal and professional journey. I came in touch with the tech community and I learned about Google Developer Groups & Google Developer Experts programs. I started volunteering for the GDG Cloud Ahmedabad chapter during my GDSC tenure and later I became one of the Community Organizers. I also started collaborating with Google Developer Experts on Web, Firebase, and Machine Learning projects and made some open-source contributions.

Everyone from the community was so welcoming and helpful. I’d highly recommend everyone join these developer programs by Google and get the best out of it. I also received mentorship from GDG Community Leads and Google Developer Experts for my professional career. They helped me connect with the right set of people and guided me to kick-start my professional career with MediaAgility, which is part of the Google Cloud Partner ecosystem. Since then, I have been working on Web & Google Cloud in my professional capacity and in my personal capacity as well.

I was motivated by the Google Cloud ecosystem in India and I cleared six Google Cloud Certifications, which created a huge impact in my personal and professional growth.

What Google tools have you used to build?

I started using Firebase as a Web Engineer. It has been very helpful when it comes to adding Authentication, storing application data in Firestore, and hosting web-app front-end static files over a CDN using Firebase Hosting. While building a set of web apps, I started exploring Machine Learning and used TensorFlow for building ML models for different use cases. Since then, I started using Google Cloud ML APIs and Cloud Functions for adding more functionalities to my web apps.

While working on these projects, I came across the Google Cloud Partner ecosystem and joined MediaAgility (now part of Persistent Systems) as a Full-Stack Engineer. Since then, I have been working on Google Cloud with Google Cloud PSO and enterprise customers.

Which tool has been your favorite? Why?

Cloud Run is something that I really like as an Application Developer. Since it’s a serverless compute platform, I can spend more time on building my application rather than worrying about my infrastructure. Firebase Authentication, Cloud Firestore, and Cloud Storage are also tools that I really love. They help me create full-stack apps and ship faster to production.

Tell us about something you've built in the past using Google tools. What will you create with Google Bard?

Since we’re in the wave of Generative AI right now, I have been working on building a number of apps using Google Cloud Run, BigQuery, Cloud Storage, Generative AI studio, Model Garden on Vertex AI and PaLM models. Recently, I built a chat application interface which provides insights from structured enterprise data warehouse and unstructured files, along with enterprise-grade data governance and security.

What advice would you give someone starting in their developer journey?

Be a consistent learner and a persistent explorer. It’s great to cultivate a learning habit, which will help you all the way in your personal and professional journey. This will not only help you explore new things, but it will also help you master something that you really love to do. As a beginner, it would be good to start with something that you find interesting, and then you can add a flavor of other things. For example, if you find building web apps interesting, try it. When you think you’re good at it, you can add a flavor of Machine Learning to it. That’s how you explore new things and experiment with what you know.

Become a Google Developer Student Club lead

Posted by Rachel Francois, Program Manager

Do you love programming and Google technologies? Interested in using your tech skills to help your community? Excited to teach other students to code? If the answer to these three questions is yes, we encourage you to apply to be a Lead of Google Developer Student Clubs https://developers.google.com/community/gdsc/leads!

The application for 2023-2024 Leads is OPEN. Get started at goo.gle/gdsc-leads.

Here are a few more details about the program:

What are Google Developer Student Clubs?

Google Developer Student Clubs (GDSC) are university-based community groups for students interested in Google technologies and programming. There are Google Developer Student Clubs in over 110 countries around the world that include undergraduate and graduate students. GDSC members teach each other about Machine Learning, Android app development, Google Cloud, Flutter, and other exciting technologies.

Clubs host events, guest speakers, and hackathons. Many participate in the GDSC Solution Challenge. Students who participate in GDSC have the opportunity to build new skills and learn with their peers and often have the chance to create technical solutions for their communities.

For example, COMSATS Wah University GDSC lead Ahsan Aman built an Android app to detect currency counterfeiting, a problem in his community in Northern Pakistan.

“Through leading my university’s Google Developer Student Club in Islamabad, I came across Machine Learning and other products like Google Teachable Machine,” he says. “With the resources and guidance available from Google, I applied my new skills in across tools like Google Teachable Machine and Android development to build 5Hazar, an application that aims to scan and detect fake currency notes using Machine Learning.”

How will I improve my skills as a GDSC Lead?

As a Google Developer Student Club Lead, you’ll:

  • Receive mentorship from Google.
  • Join a global community of leaders.
  • Share your skills with peers.
  • Teach other students to code and use Google technologies.
  • Build solutions for real-world problems.

Not only will you learn technical skills, you’ll grow your leadership skills, by organizing a student organization and establishing a vision for your community.

“GDSC helped me with personal skills, soft skills, such as public speaking and leadership,” says 2019 GDSC Vancouver Island University lead Lenz Paul. “The highlight was that I learned a lot about Google Cloud technologies, by holding workshops and delivering content.”

How can I find a Google Developer Student Club near me?

There are over 1900 Google Developer Student Clubs in over 110 around the world. Find a club near you here, or learn how to start your own, here.

When do I need to submit the application?

We encourage students to submit your application as soon as possible. Learn more about your region’s application deadlines here, and learn more about GDSC’s program criteria.

Make a difference in your community

From working to solve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals to combating climate issues, Google Developer Student Club leads are learning valuable coding skills while making a true difference.

“Being a GDSC Lead has brought me tremendous opportunities,” says Rose Niousha, founder of GDSC Waseda University and Women Techmakers ambassador. “Since one of my biggest objectives was to tackle the gender barrier in the tech industry through my GDSC community, I actively hosted events during International Women's Day (IWD) month.”

We look forward to seeing what our next group of Google Developer Student Club Leads can accomplish. Join the fun here.

Note: Google Developer Student Clubs are student-led independent organizations, and their presence does not indicate a relationship between Google and the students' universities.

How students are making an impact on mental health through technology

Posted by Laura Cincera, Program Manager Google Developer Student Clubs Europe

Mental health remains one of the most neglected areas of healthcare worldwide, with nearly 1 billion people currently living with a mental health condition that requires support. But what if there was a way to make mental health care more accessible and tailored to individual needs?

The Google Developer Student Clubs Solution Challenge aims to inspire and empower university students to tackle our most pressing challenges - like mental health. The Solution Challenge is an annual opportunity to turn visionary ideas into reality and make a real-world impact using the United Nations' 17 Sustainable Development Goals as a blueprint for action. Students from all over the world work together and apply their skills to create innovative solutions using Google technology, creativity and the power of community.

One of last year’s top Solution Challenge proposals, Xtrinsic, was a cooperation between two communities of student leaders - GDSC Freiburg in Germany and GDSC Kyiv in Ukraine. The team developed an innovative mental health research and therapy application that adapts to users' personal habits and needs providing effective support at scale.

The team behind Xtrinsic includes Alexander Monneret, Chikordili Fabian Okeke, Emma Rein, and Vandysh Kateryna, who come from different backgrounds but share a common mission to improve mental health research and therapy.

Using a wearable device and TensorFlow, Xtrinsic helps users manage their symptoms by providing customized behavioral suggestions based on their physiological signs. It acts as an intervention tool for mental health issues such as nightmares, panic attacks, and anxiety and adapts the user's environment to their specific needs - which is essential for effective interventions. For example, if the user experiences a panic attack, the app detects the physiological signs using a smartwatch and a machine learning model, and triggers appropriate action, such as playing relaxing sounds, changing the room light to blue, or starting a guided breathing exercise. The solution was built using several Google technologies, including Android, Assistant/Actions on Google, Firebase, Flutter, Google Cloud, TensorFlow, WearOS, DialogFlow, and Google Health Services.

The team behind Xtrinsic is diverse. Alexander, Chikordili, Emma and Vandysh come from different backgrounds but share a passion for AI and how it can be leveraged to improve the lives of many. They all recognize the importance of shedding awareness on mental health and creating a supportive culture that is free from stigma. Their personal experiences in conflict areas, such as Syria and Ukraine inspired them to develop the application.

Solution Challenge Google Developer Student Clubs Xtrinsic project For mental health research and therapy GDSC Ukraine and Germany

Xtrinsic was recognized as one of the Top 3 winning teams in the 2022 Google Solution Challenge for its innovative approach to mental health research and therapy. The team has since supported several other social impact initiatives - helping grow the network of entrepreneurs and community leaders in Europe and beyond.

Google Developer Student Clubs Help students grow and build solutions

Learn more about Google Developer Student Clubs

If you feel inspired to make a positive change through technology, submit your project to Solution Challenge 2023 here. And if you’re passionate about technology and are ready to use your skills to help your local community, then consider becoming a Google Developer Student Clubs Lead!

We encourage all interested university students to apply here and submit their applications as soon as possible. The applications in Europe, India, North America and MENA are currently open.

Learn more about Google Developer Student Clubs here.

Solution Challenge 2023: Use Google Technologies to Address the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals

Posted by Rachel Francois, Google Developer Student Clubs, Global Program Manager

Each year, the Google Developer Student Clubs Solution Challenge invites university students to develop solutions for real-world problems using one or more Google products or platforms. How could you use Android, Firebase, TensorFlow, Google Cloud, Flutter, or any of your favorite Google technologies to promote employment for all, economic growth, and climate action?

Join us to build solutions for one or more of the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals. These goals were agreed upon in 2015 by all 193 United Nations Member States and aim to end poverty, ensure prosperity, and protect the planet by 2030.

One 2022 Solution Challenge participant said, “I love how it provides the opportunity to make a real impact while pursuing undergraduate studies. It helped me practice my expertise in a real-world setting, and I built a project I can proudly showcase on my portfolio.”

Solution Challenge prizes

Participants will receive specialized prizes at different stages:

  • The top 100 teams receive customized mentorship from Google and experts to take solutions to the next level, branded swag, and a certificate.
  • The top 10 finalists receive additional mentorship, a swag box, and the opportunity to showcase their solutions to Google teams and developers all around the world during the virtual 2023 Solution Challenge Demo Day, live on YouTube.
  • Contest finalists - In addition to the swag box, each individual from the seven teams not in the top three will receive a Cash Prize of $1,000 per student. Winnings for each qualifying team will not exceed $4,000.
  • Top 3 winners - In addition to the swag box, each individual from the top 3 winning teams will receive a Cash Prize of $3,000 and a feature on the Google Developers Blog. Winnings for each qualifying team will not exceed $12,000
 

Joining the Solution Challenge

There are four steps to join the Solution Challenge and get started on your project:

  1. Register at goo.gle/solutionchallenge and join a Google Developer Student Club at your college or university. If there is no club at your university, you can join the closest one through our event platform.
  2. Select one or more of the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals to address.
  3. Build a solution using Google technology.
  4. Create a demo and submit your project by March 31, 2023. 

    Google Resources for Solution Challenge participants

    Google will support Solution Challenge participants with resources to help students build strong projects, including:

    • Live online sessions with Q&As
    • Mentorship from Google, Google Developer Experts, and the Google Developer Student Club community
    • Curated Codelabs designed by Google Developers
    • Access to Design Sprint guidelines developed by Google Ventures
    • and more!
    “During the preparation and competition, we learned a great deal,” said a 2022 Solution Challenge team member. “That was part of the reason we chose to participate in this competition: the learning opportunities are endless.”

    Winner announcement dates

    Once all projects are submitted, our panel of judges will evaluate and score each submission using specific criteria.

    After that, winners will be announced in three rounds.

    Round 1 (April): The top 100 teams will be announced.

    Round 2 (June): After the top 100 teams submit their new and improved solutions, 10 finalists will be announced.

    Round 3 (August): The top 3 grand prize winners will be announced live on YouTube during the 2023 Solution Challenge Demo Day.

    We can’t wait to see the solutions you create with your passion for building a better world, coding skills, and a little help from Google technologies.

    Learn more and sign up for the 2023 Solution Challenge here.


    I got the time to push my creativity to the next level. It helped me attain more information from more knowledgeable people by expanding my network. Working together and building something was a great challenge and one of the best experiences, too. I liked the idea of working on the challenge to present a solution.

    ~2022 Solution Challenge participant

    From GDSC Lead to Flutter developer: Lenz Paul’s journey

    Posted by Kübra Zengin, North America Regional Lead, Google Developers

    Switching careers at age 30, after eight years on the job, is a brave thing to do. Lenz Paul spent eight years working in sales at Bell, a large Canadian telecommunications company. During that time, he found his interest sparked by the technology solutions that helped him do his job more effectively. He decided to follow his passion and switch careers to focus on engineering.

    “I found I had a knack for technology and was curious about it,” he says. “Sales has so many manual processes, and I always proposed tech solutions and even learned a little programming to make my daily life easier.”

    At 30, Lenz entered Vancouver Island University in Canada to pursue a computer science degree.

    Becoming a GDSC Lead

    When his department chair, Gara Pruesse, emailed students about the opportunity to start and lead a Google Developer Student Club at the university, Lenz jumped at the chance and applied. He was selected to be the GDSC Vancouver Island University lead in 2019 and led the group for a year. He hoped to meet more technology enthusiasts and to use the programming skills he was learning in his courses to help other students who wanted to learn Google technologies.

    “It was my first year at university, starting in the technology field as a career transition, and I was hoping to network,” Lenz recalls. “I read the [GDSC] description about sharing knowledge and thought this would be a way to use the skills I was learning in school practically, meet people, and impact my community.”

    As part of his role as a GDSC lead, Lenz used Google workshops, Google Cloud Skills Boost, and codelabs to learn Google Cloud and Flutter outside of class. Google provided Cloud credits to GDSC Vancouver Island University, which Lenz shared with his seven core team members, so they could all try new tools and figure out how to teach their fellow students to use them. Then, they taught the rest of the student club how to use Google technologies. They also hosted two Google engineers on-site as speakers.

    “GDSC helped me with personal skills, soft skills, such as public speaking and leadership,” Lenz says. “The highlight was that I learned a lot about Google Cloud technologies, by holding workshops and delivering content.”

    Working for Google’s Tech Equity Collective

    Following his GDSC experience, Lenz worked as a contractor for Google’s Tech Equity Collective, which focuses on improving diversity in tech. Lenz tutored a group of 20 students for about six weeks before being promoted to an instructor role and then becoming the lead teacher for Google Cloud technologies.

    “My GDSC experience really helped me shine in my teaching role,” Lenz says. “I was already very familiar with Google Cloud, due to the many workshops I organized and taught for my GDSC, so it was easy to adapt it for my TEC class.”

    Becoming a Flutter developer

    Lenz began using Flutter in 2019, when the technology was just two years old. He points out that there is nobody in the world with ten years of experience in Flutter; it’s relatively new for everyone.

    “I love the ecosystem, and it was a great time to get started with it,” he says. “It’s such a promising technology.”

    Lenz says Dart, Flutter’s programming language, is a powerful, modern, object-oriented language with C-style syntax that’s easy to learn and easy to use.

    “Dart is clean, easy to scale, can support any size project, and it has the backing of Google,” Lenz says. “It’s a great language for building scripts or server apps. It allows for building mobile apps, web apps, and desktop apps, and it even supports embedded devices via the Flutter Framework.”

    Lenz used Google Cloud Skills Boost and Google codelabs to learn Flutter and is now a full-time Flutter developer.

    “I’m excited about the future of Flutter and Dart,” he says. “I think Flutter is going to continue to be a big player in the app development space and can't wait to see what the Flutter team comes up with next.”

    In August 2022, CMiC (Computer Methods International Corporation) in Toronto, a construction ERP software company, hired Lenz as a full-time Flutter developer. He’s a Level 2 software engineer. CMiC builds enterprise-grade apps using Flutter for iOS, Android and web from a single code base. Flutter also helped him further his understanding of Google Cloud. As he used Flutter and learned more about backend services and how they communicate with frontend apps, he increased his knowledge of Google Cloud.

    While learning Flutter, Lenz built several apps using Firebase backend as a service (BaaS) because Firebase provides many Flutter plugins that are easy to integrate into your apps, such as authentication, storage, and analytics.

    "Firebase will help you get your app up and running quickly and easily,” says Lenz. “I also used Firebase app distribution to share the apps while I was developing them, which allowed me to quickly get feedback from testers without having to go through the app stores.”

    Lenz encourages new developers looking to advance in their careers to try out Google Cloud Skills Boost, codelabs, six-month certificates, and technical development guide.

    “The experience I gained as a GDSC lead and at Google’s Tech Equity Collective prepared me for my software engineer role at CMIC in Toronto, Canada, and I thank GDSC for my current and future opportunities,” Lenz says.

    What’s next for Lenz

    Right now, Lenz is focused on mastering his full-time role, so he’s pacing himself with regard to other commitments. He wants to make an impact and to recruit other Canadians to the technology field. The Tech Equity Collective’s mission is amazing and aligns with his values of enabling community and sharing knowledge. He’d like to continue to participate in something that would align with these values.

    “It’s the greatest feeling when I can make a difference,” he says.

    —

    If you’re a student and would like to join a Google Developer Student Club community, look for a chapter near you here. Interested in becoming a GDSC lead like Lenz? Visit this page for more information. Don’t have a GDSC at your university, but want to start one? Visit the program page to learn more.

    Creating a STEM culture on campus in Uganda

    Posted by Muhammad (Auwal) Samu, Developer Communities Regional Lead, Sub-Saharan Africa

    Halimah Bukirwa says she felt like she knew nothing about computers or coding when she started university but threw herself into learning about STEM as much as possible.

    “I committed to being the best at it, since I was given this awesome opportunity to actually study it.” Originally thinking she’d pursue a career in the field of aviation, Halimah joined several developer communities to learn more about engineering. That’s when she found the Google Developer Student Club (GDSC) at her university.

    Creating a culture of participation on campus

    She joined the local GDSC chapter as a core team member first, helping out with general logistics and planning, then the next year she applied to become the chapter Lead. Now, with all her community learnings, this fourth-year software engineering student at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda, sees herself as a community leader and has her sights set on helping other software developers grow.

    Learnings and proud moments for the community

    The campus club achieved many milestones during Halimah’s tenure as the GDSC Lead. The chapter hosted over 40 events and reached over two thousand developers at her university. She also helped her chapter find inspiration to submit 11 projects to the annual GDSC Solution Challenge. These efforts were the result of intentionally creating a culture of support and helping other students find their footing as developers.


    “When we were starting GDSC, our objective was to help students learn, connect, and grow into developers, and identify problems in our community and address them using technology. GDSC has given students hands-on skills to apply what they study and create solutions for the problems in their communities.”

     

    Creating technical solutions for local problems

    The GDSC Makarere chapter submitted 11 projects to the annual GSDC Solution Challenge to come up with technical ways to solve community challenges, and one notable team from the club, MpaMpe, proudly finished in the Top 50 global projects with its crowdfunding hybrid app intended to reduce the financial and digital divide via crowdsourcing and donations.

    Halimah also answered the call to change the world through coding by also participating in the global GDSC Solution Challenge. “I discovered that technology is a tool we can use to drive change and transformation–to address the problems in our communities and create solutions.”

    Noting that Uganda has small women-owned enterprises that face high charges on bulk transactions. She and her team built a payment solutions app called Alfasente to help businesses digitize their payments at a lower cost. The project used Firebase to build the application backend and hosted it on the Google Cloud Platform. The team submitted to the Solution Challenge with the goal of addressing the UN Sustainable Goal #8, Decent Work and Economic Growth.

    Improving local farming conditions using Google Cloud Platform

    Beyond these Google tools and technologies, exposure to GDSC (along with her engineering curriculum) has allowed Halimah to quickly learn new technologies and concepts.


    “Organizing these events has been so fulfilling because I have witnessed so many students' lives transform. My university has received recognition from other entities, and I have been consulted by other people and organizations on tech-related issues.”


    No matter the tool or its application she shares that the GDSC program can help speed up the learning process. “We wanted to make sure that students find their place in the tech ecosystem, learn as much as they can, and connect and grow with other people,” she says. “We have seen that come to life. So many students are interested that now we need more room for students.”

    Halimah says she’s used the Google Cloud Platform for several university projects and internship work and is keen on using technology to address issues affecting the cultivation of a root vegetable called cassava that grows in her region.

    What’s next for Halimah and the GDSC chapter

    Halimah says she is honored to be considered as a potential recipient of the EMEA Generational Google Scholarship program for women studying computer science in Europe, the Middle East or Africa. She’s planning to better learn TensorFlow and is helping friends get started with Flutter projects, learning Flutter from codelabs, tutorials, videos, and documentation.


    “I am passionate about AI, ML, Data Science, and Cloud Computing, and I am confident that I can address the problems in the industries that I am passionate about, too. My goal is to graduate, go into a master's program, and possibly do an internship at a technology company.”


    Halimah is excited about her career journey and pleased by how much her GDSC club is growing with the new students starting their school term.

    Join a Google Developer Student Club near you

    Google Developer Student Clubs (GDSC) are community groups for college and university students like Halimah who are interested in Google developer technologies.

    With over 1800+ chapters in 112 countries, GDSC aims to empower developers like Halimah to help their communities by building technical solutions. If you’re a student and would like to join a Google Developer Student Club community, look for a chapter near you here, or visit the program page to learn more about starting one in your area.

    Meet Rose Niousha, GDSC Waseda Founder & WTM Ambassador

    Posted by Takuo Suzuki, Developer Relations Program Manager, Japan

    Rose Niousha wanted to create a community where students could explore their technical interests without being held back by external factors or stereotypes. A passion for inclusion set her on a path to growing her Google Developer Student Clubs chapter and discovering the Women Techmakers (WTM) program.

    After majoring in Computer Science at Waseda University, Rose realized many students had difficulty applying what they learned in school to practical environments and internships. Seeing a gap between theory and practice, she aimed to tackle these problems by founding a Google Developer Student Club (GDSC) on her campus. Through her leadership, the club became the largest chapter in Japan, with 177 active members. This post highlights how Rose created a big impact in her community and then became a WTM Ambassador.

    How GDSC Waseda emphasized inclusivity in their community

    Rose wanted the Waseda community to champion diversity and inclusion. When Rose selected her core team members, she aimed to ensure diverse perspectives and different educational backgrounds were represented. By recruiting members from other majors, people didn't feel like outsiders in the community. As a result, the members of GDSC Waseda consisted of both technical and non-technical majors, with 47.8% being female students, marking an inclusive 50-50 gender ratio that is not typical among tech communities.

    The 2021-2022 GDSC Waaseda core team (Tokyo, Japan)
    After building a core team for the chapter, Rose decided that breaking the language barrier could establish a more inclusive community. Rose wanted students from all backgrounds to be able to communicate with each other so she chose English as the main language for the chapter. Since her university is home to an international community, this helped address a common challenge in Japanese universities: students' lack of confidence to discuss professional fields in English. This brought students together and helped everyone improve their language abilities.

     

    Hosting programs to educate, inspire, and connect students


    The chapter hosted over 30 activities like speaker sessions and hands-on programming workshops where students gained a practical understanding of tools like Flutter, Google Cloud Platform, and Firebase.

    Flutter sessions were taught to students so they could create natively compiled mobile apps and submit to the annual GDSC Solution Challenge. Firebase sessions helped backend teams handle user databases as well as get a basic understanding of NoSQL databases. Students then could implement this technology and strengthen their project’s scalability and data security.

    Through collaborations with other companies, GDSC Waseda helped students to experience different disciplines like coding/programming, team management, and design thinking. These workshops helped students find internship opportunities and even students majoring in non-technical majors, like humanities, secured internships at tech firms in roles such as UX/UI design and PM roles since they were exposed to a practical side of the industry.
    Event Participants from GDSC Waseda (Tokyo, Japan)

    Leadership in action: GDSC Solution Challenge efforts in Japan


    As a GDSC lead, Rose encouraged participation in the annual GDSC Solution Challenge. She approached it as a starting point, rather than a goal. With this positive attitude, four teams from the chapter submitted projects and team mimi4me, a mobile safety application using Machine Learning, became the first team from Japan to be selected as one of the Global Top 50. The team is continuing to scale their solution by planning to publish the application on Google Play.

    Rose Niousha gives certificate to the Mini Solution Challenge winning team (Tokyo, Japan)

    To showcase the efforts of all the teams after the Solution Challenge, the chapter hosted a Mini Solution Challenge event. All teams gave a presentation describing the solutions that they submitted, and event participants voted for their favorite project. Additionally, another team of students from GDSC Waseda and Keio founded an E-Commerce startup from their time at GDSC.

    Reflections and accomplishments along the way


    Through Google connections and using tools like LinkedIn to find other like-minded leaders, Rose reached out to many inspiring women working in the tech industry. She prepared for the events for weeks in advance by conducting several meetings with the speakers. Through these helpful sessions, GDSC Waseda was able to inspire many more women on campus to join their community and discover their interests. Now, GDSC Waseda is proud to have a diverse community with a 50-50 gender ratio in members.

    “Being a GDSC Lead has brought me tremendous opportunities,” says Rose. “Since one of my biggest objectives was to tackle the gender barrier in the tech industry through my GDSC community, I actively hosted events during International Women's Day (IWD) month.”


    Rose Niousha with the Global Head of Google Developer Community Program, Erica Hanson (New York City, New York, USA)

    Building an inclusive future as a WTM ambassador

    Rose worked with her Google Community Manager in Japan, Reisa Matsuda, who helped develop her passion for creating a diverse and inclusive community. Reisa told Rose about the Women Techmakers (WTM) program and encouraged her to take advantage of many opportunities. With mentorship and guidance, soon after Rose became a GDSC Lead, she joined Women Techmakers (WTM) as an Ambassador.


    Reisa Matsuda and Rose at GDSC Leads Graduation

    As an alumnus of Women Developer Academy (WDA), a program that equips women in tech with the skills, resources, and support they need to become a tech presenter and speaker, Rose felt confident and prepared to speak as a panelist at this year’s International Women’s Day event hosted by WTM Tokyo - the largest IWD event in Japan with over 180 participants. During the talk, she shared her experience with the WDA program and personal stories related to WTM’s IWD 2022 "Progress, not Perfection” campaign.


    Rose Niousha with the Head of Google Women Techmakers, Caitlin Morrissey (Mountain View, California, USA)

    As part of her involvement with the WTM program, Rose attended Google I/O offline at Shoreline on May 11, 2022. It was the first in-person Google developer event she had ever attended.


    “I was surprised by its massive scale,” says Rose. “Kicking off the event with an inspiring talk by Google's CEO, Sundar Pichai, I had an amazing time listening to talks and networking. During my time in California, I was able to meet with many inspiring students and professionals, and bring unique ideas back to my chapter.”

     

    Join a Google Developer Student Club near you

    Google Developer Student Clubs (GDSC) are community groups for college and university students like Rose who are interested in Google developer technologies. With over 1,800+ chapters in 112 countries, GDSC aims to empower developers like Rose to help their communities by building technical solutions. If you’re a student and would like to join a Google Developer Student Club community, look for a chapter near you here, or visit the program page to learn more about starting one in your area.

    Learn more about Women Techmakers

    Google’s Women Techmakers program provides visibility, community, and resources for women in technology. Women Techmakers Ambassadors are global leaders passionate about impacting their communities and building a world where all women can thrive in tech.