Hello and See y’all laits-ter!

 Xin chào và Hẹn gặp lại!

Sophomore has been one of the best year of my life for a lot of reasons.

1. I travelled to so many places and tried out so many good food for the first time. I went to California visiting my brother at Berkeley and tried out so many Vietnamese restaurants. I visited my sister at TCU and tasted even more Vietnamese food there including phở, spring rolls and fried rice. I went to Chicago for the first time in Spring break and ate deep dish pizza. (So cheesy, creamy and crunchy)
2. I moved to West Campus and felt more at ease with the new place. The dorm was so small and chaotic. I never felt like coming back to the dorm like the way I want to come back to my own apartment. There is a feeling of home that I cultivate in my apartment which makes me want to come back and relax.
3. Last but not least, I got a job at LAITS.

My second half of my freshman, I was overwhelmed and did not know how to balance my time between school and other commitments; that’s why I quitted my job as an event staff for Parking and Transportation.Moving to my sophomore, I was clueless about what I want to do with my life. Getting a job here has been one of my defining moments in my second year of college.

However, LAITS offered me an opportunity to learn and grow. At LAITS, I built up my skills slowly with GRAV. My first ever project is Exposure Therapy Lab. I remembered that I felt so overjoyed when I worked on my first task which is fixing different small tasks like moving an item in the navigation down a level and moving a whole section of images of researchers to a whole new different page. Then, the difficulty of the tasks increased with each project. My favorite project is the Master of Arts in Economics. In this project, I managed to design and build a whole WordPress website. I have overcame a lot of hurdles along the way in undertaking this project. However, I pushed through with researching and asking questions from other STAs and supervisor. Maybe, this is what I want to do. Always figuring out the problem and solving it. Always learn and apply what I absorbed. Plus, I will not forget to ask for help if the tasks are too hard. In the last few days, I can see how much I am familiar with WordPress, Grav and Figma to the point that I can train others.

I am excited for the new beginning with the next semester when I can bear more responsibilities.

 

Future?

The summer looks very exciting for me.

Last summer, I had so much quality time with my family. However, I felt like I was not very productive and did not learn as much as I want to. Therefore, this summer, I wanted to take on more opportunities.

1. Business Development Student: I will work on the development and launch of UT Discovery Connect, an opt-in web-based directory for UT researchers to share their capabilities with potential research or business. I will prepare draft researcher profiles and communications. In this job, I will need to research and write up a lot of profiles for researcher. The duties of the job can also expand with managing the WordPress sites in which I know LAITS fully prepared me for this.
2. Front-End Engineer Internship at Claudius Legal: I am so glad that I got the internship even though I applied really late. I will work on the design and development of the product with the company. The job relied heavily on front-end skills like Figma, HTML, CSS, JavaScript and also some back-end knowledge with Django. I know that I need to catch up on Django since it is a new framework for me. Regardless, I am excited to grow and build some stuff. LAITS equipped me with necessary design and coding skills for the job!

Moreover, actually, before I undertook these two jobs. I will go to Philippines for a mission trip of my church. I am extremely ecstatic because I will grow spiritually and explore a brand new countries with other brothers and sisters in Christ. I really pray that this will give me more clarify about what I want to do.

 

This year would not be the best year without all of y’all. This is my thank you note to every single one of you. Thank you for being a part of my STA journey. 

Thank You Note

Stacy: Thank you for being such a patient and excellent teacher. I learned so much about web development and front-end engineering from you. The way you explain is very clear, and the expectation is laid out very comprehensively regarding the tasks I need to complete. I grow with this position because of all of the assigned projects and your superb teaching. Thank you and I look forward to even more learning from you.

Valerie: Thank you for being such an amazing supervisor. You always make the office feel like a cozy environment. I really appreciated your effort in getting to know all of the STAs. I am also very happy that I got to share the Vietnamese culture with you. You have inspired and taught me a lot regarding management and design. I really want to see how I can grow even more next semester under your supervision.

Maddy: You are truly a talented designer. I got to see how I can design a wireframe and then translate that into Figma prototype. The process is broken down very clearly with your guidance. I love every minute of working on the design and the Figma interface. I am more comfortable with designing on Figma and can’t wait to learn and apply that in upcoming projects.

Marianne: Thank you! You are always fast with your response whenever I have questions regarding WordPress, terminal or coding in general. You are always very patient and clear with your instructions. Because of your teaching, I can navigate WordPress interface with my eyes closed (jk but you know what I mean). Look forward to even more collaboration with you on projects or just learn more from your work ethics and mindset.

Marissa: Can’t believe we are in the same Art History class. You are one talented Design STA. I really love your logo design and your way of thinking in choosing the logo. You are always cool and calm. Love to see how you can grow further in your position here as an STA.

Lorena: Hey! Hope you have a great time in LA with your internship and courses. I know you will do amazingly there given your skills and experience. You have been working on a wide range of projects that require a broad skill scope. I truly admire your talent and your design mindsets. I don’t know if I will meet you again, but regardless, I hope to see you grow and apply your skills in your future job. I love the Instagram stories that you post about the design process of characters. It was very entertaining and inspiring.

Carrie: 你好! It has been truly a pleasure to get to know and work with you during this year. You are amazing with your skills and a cool person to work with. I hope everything will work out for your future. If I get to visit China, I will surely hit you up first to be my tour guide. From your project and STA presentation, I got to learn about UI/UX process and strengthen my knowledge in class. Thank you for working on Friday and make Friday shifts become so much fun.

Leilani: Wasssup! Thank you for letting me borrow your EGG. It was truly eggcellent to hold onto the stuffed animals whenever I am stressed. Coding is very stressful sometimes, especially when the code works 5 mins before but now the program broke. You are a caring and amazing designer/manager. It is my privilege to see how you can grow from a designer to a manager with tons of Excel files. I can see the impact from De’sha Bass-McClellan carrying onto you. Can’t wait to see you grow even more next semester.

Louisa: Wow! I never know you are Liverpool Fan and has an amazing Instagram art account. It has been really nice knowing and working alongside with you in the office for the past year. You are very knowledgeable with design, history and everything in between. You showcase a unique work ethics and demonstrate a set of desirable skill that future employers will compete with each other to have you. Although it’s sad that we will not work together anymore, the impact you have in the office will always be here and carried on. Please visit LAITS anytime you come back to Austin.

Adrian: You are amazing manager and designer. I love how you are always chilled and make other people feel relaxed when talking with you. It has been a fun time working with you. Even though we never work on a project together, I know you are talented and versatile with different softwares and application. You are gifted with a design mindset and I am ecstatic to witness your development in your job upon graduation. So sad I cannot see you anymore but please keep in contact.

Daniella: Hi! It has been my pleasure to know you. The world is truly small when my roommate also know you though Guadaloop. From my roommate, I already know you are one talented and experienced back-end and system developer. But through STA position, I can see how you are a superstar. You learned and adapted to new environment fairly quickly. I believe that it is your innate talent coupled with your hustle mindset that enables you to absorb knowledge at this fast pace. I know wherever you go, you would be appreciated because of your work ethics and professionalism. It’s sad that we will not see each other next semester but we may cross path and I will be so amazed at who you have become!

Isaiah: Welcome to the team! I know it has only been few months, but we talked a lot during this time. I hope you can grow further and learn so much about web development during this summer. I believe at the end, you will know about the inner working of WordPress and why web development is so cool! Next semester, I am excited to do more projects with you!