“Be creative, be resilient and remember - there's room for everyone!" – Annika Nel, BScHons in Computer Science (2020)
Annika Nel is currently employed as a backend developer at ClearScore, a financial technology company, with previous experience as a data scientist and software developer. She graduated from Stellenbosch University with her BSc in Mathematical Sciences (Computer Science) in 2018 and completed additional majors in mathematics and theoretical physics in 2019. She obtained a BScHons Computer Science in 2020.
Her typical day as a backend developer involves coding, a few meetings and lots of investigation and problem-solving. “Most of my work involves maintaining or adding features to services that form the basis of our company's app," she explains. “I work on a small team which comprises the South African part of the business. However, I regularly interact with developers in the UK and Australia in my day-to-day work. We work with cutting edge technology to serve over 16 million users across multiple countries."
What she enjoys most about working as a developer, is to design and implement solutions that she can take pride in. She also enjoys collaborating with other developers and learning about the business from team members outside of her function.
Annika says the approach to software development she learnt while studying at Stellenbosch University has been a great help in the day-to-day decisions she makes while coding. “In particular, the functional programming course and the work I did on my BScHons degree project (which focused on combining machine learning with swarm intelligence to create a novel classifier) played a big role in my appointment to my current position at ClearScore. In a more general sense, the challenging courses I took on while at Stellenbosch University expanded what I thought I was capable of and fostered greater confidence in my own abilities," she says.
“The type of skills you gain from studying computer science opens a wide world of career opportunities. You can apply your knowledge to help solve problems in almost any sector. So be creative, be resilient and remember - there's room for everyone!"
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