My name is Phung Nguyen. I am a 4th-year Computer Science student. During my spring semester, I had the privilege of interning with 3D Girls Inc., a non-profit organization that works to educate and empower young women and girls to advocate for themselves and their families. For the duration of my internship, my work was primarily focused on creating a comprehensive digital technical manual that would serve all staff, developers, and designers working on the Girls Link Up (GLU) platform. The GLU platform is an online platform that provides STEAM and social-emotional wellness content for 500+ girls.
Some of my key achievements during the internship included writing a 97-page technical manual that outlines the platform’s technical infrastructure, operational procedures, maintenance protocols, and troubleshooting guidelines. I also analyzed the current user experience to identify user pain points and offer potential improvements in the user interface. Since the 3D Girls Inc. staff had existing data on the current user experience through a feedback survey of 34 girls, I organized the qualitative responses through an affinity map to better understand common patterns in the girls’ sentiments that might reveal user pain points. Doing this helped me to identify that a common sentiment was the need for step-by-step guidance throughout the games to help them engage with the learning outcomes. Over 70% of the girls mentioned in the survey that they felt lost or confused during gameplay, with many requesting clearer instructions. With this in mind, I proposed solutions such as adding help tooltips in every game that the girls can hover over to easily reference instructions.
One of the biggest takeaways from my experience is not overestimating how much time I have to complete something. I discovered this lesson later in my internship when I realized that I had taken on more responsibilities than I could comfortably handle, mainly because I underestimated the time required for certain tasks. As a result, I have grown significantly during this internship by improving my ability to communicate about realistic timelines. Now, when I am assigned a new task, I ask clarifying questions about its scope before immediately agreeing to take it on because I’m afraid to say no.
Reflecting on my overall experience, I am grateful to have had the chance to be part of an organization where I strongly believe in its mission. Raioni and the staff at 3D Girls Inc. supported me throughout my internship from start to finish and have taught me the importance of grit by seeing them work hard every day to bring the vision of their mission to life by continuing to support as many girls and women as possible. This was an experience that I won’t ever take for granted.