Name: Zulkarnain Choudhury

Internship, Co-op or Research Site: Grameen Bank

Position Title: Intern

Major(s)/Minor(s): Economics

Expected Graduation Year: 2017

Briefly describe your internship, co-op,  or research opportunity, including your day-to-day tasks, responsibilities, and assignments.

I started my internship program with Grameen Bank (a renowned microfinance organization) in Dhaka, Bangladesh in June 2015. Grameen Bank provides small loans to some of the poorest citizens in rural areas in Bangladesh without any collateral. These loans are given so that those people can invest the money to improve their living conditions, start a small business or send their children to school. The bank has received recognition for its method by the World Bank, United Nations and all over the world. The bank main motive is to reduce poverty in Bangladesh.

My job as an intern was to visit centers in several districts in Bangladesh (of Grameen) and listen to the people's stories, why they want to take the loan and make sure that they are eligible for the loan. My task was to be the banker who would develop a relationship with his borrowers and approve the loan to them. I was trained to ask the people questions like why they wanted the loan, and what they would do with the money. I was under the supervision of the officer who usually does the approval. During the internship period, I took training classes from my internship coordinator to learn about Grameen Bank and its methodology and how to approach to customers. I visited 7 different centers in 7 different villages (I had to bear my own expenses which was not much). I also went on a village trip for a week to stay and observe the method and see how the bank operates in rural Bangladesh. At the end of the month-long internship I submitted an internship report based on my whole experience.

Describe the process of obtaining your internship, research, or co-op opportunity.

Grameen Bank is very well-known organization and it was my dream to work for the bank after it received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for it's extraordinary approach in reducing poverty in Bangladesh with use of microfinance and microcredit. I went on their website and did a research on their internship program and sent them an email. After a week, they replied to my email requesting for my resume and a recommendation letter from a professor. After they received everything, they sent me a confirmation that I can start as soon as I go to Bangladesh for my summer.

What have you enjoyed the most about your position or organization/company?

What I have enjoyed the most about this internship was meeting interns from different countries who came from Europe, America and many other countries that shared this experience with me. It truly was a very enjoyable experience as we all went on village trips and I got to make some amazing friends. The most memorable part of the internship was the village trip, where I met the locals and experienced their culture.

How do you believe you have made an impact through your work?

I believe I made an impact on myself because a year ago, I was lost and didn't know what kind of career I would pursue in the future after graduating. But after doing this internship I discovered some qualities and some skills that I didn't know I had in me. I can interact well with different people, I can manage accounts, and I can speak well. I think I might be a good banker! 

Another thing that I thought of was cultural issues. The women in rural areas in Bangladesh have less say in family matters than men. The majority of Grameen's borrowers consists of women. This gives them power, confidence, and reduces the gender inequality. So if interns like us can help these women receive loans by showing them support and letting them contribute, then we’re giving them more power. This experience also got me thinking of changing my major from Economics to Financial Economics. I absolutely loved my job and I want to be involved in banking and social work in future. 

What advice would you give to another student who is seeking an internship or similar experience?

If you get an opportunity to be involved in something or do an internship, you should do it. It really helps you to discover what you are good at doing. It exhibits your skills and special qualities, and makes you realize what kind of career you want to pursue in life.

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Want to be the next Intern of the Week? Make sure to fill out this form and stay tuned. New interns are announced every Friday!

URA How-To Workshop

Tuesday, December 8
3:00 – 4:30 p.m.
Sherman Hall A Room 113

Undergraduate Research Awards provide up to $1,500 to undergraduate students to support their research or creative work with a UMBC faculty mentor on an original project. UMBC students of all years and disciplines are invited to apply, as long as they will remain enrolled at UMBC long enough to complete the proposed work.

The UMBC Cyber Defense Lab presents

Engineering Notes on Homomorphic
Private Information Retrieval

Russ Fink
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab

11:15am-12:30pm, Friday, 4 December 4 2015, ITE 231

For two years, we have been investigating applications of private information retrieval (PIR) using the additive homomorphic scheme designed by Paillier that forms the basis of a space efficient PIR system by Ostrovsky, Skeith, and Bethencourt. We have implemented a working prototype and gained some insights about the technique, and identified improvements to make it practical to real-world privacy problems. I will present an overview of the technique, present a real world use case, and discuss our technical contributions and ongoing challenges.

Dr. Russ Fink is Chief Engineer of the Enterprise Security Group at APL. He earned the PhD from UMBC with a dissertation on applying trustworthy computing to voting.

Host: Alan T. Sherman, Sorry, you need javascript to view this email address.

The UMBC Cyber Defense Lab presents

Engineering Notes on Homomorphic
Private Information Retrieval

Russ Fink
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab

11:15am-12:30pm, Friday, 4 December 4 2015, ITE 231

For two years, we have been investigating applications of private information retrieval (PIR) using the additive homomorphic scheme designed by Paillier that forms the basis of a space efficient PIR system by Ostrovsky, Skeith, and Bethencourt. We have implemented a working prototype and gained some insights about the technique, and identified improvements to make it practical to real-world privacy problems. I will present an overview of the technique, present a real world use case, and discuss our technical contributions and ongoing challenges.

Dr. Russ Fink is Chief Engineer of the Enterprise Security Group at APL. He earned the PhD from UMBC with a dissertation on applying trustworthy computing to voting.

Host: Alan T. Sherman, Sorry, you need javascript to view this email address.

The UMBC CSEE Seminar Series Presents

Addressing Energy and Big Data
Challenges in Microgrids

Prof. Ting Zhu, UMBC

1-2pm Friday, Dec 4, 2015, ITE 325B

Buildings account for over 75% of the electricity consumption in the United States. To reduce electricity usage and peak demand, many utility companies are introducing market-based time-of-use (TOU) pricing models. In parallel, government programs that increase the fraction of renewable energy are incentivizing residential consumers to adopt on-site renewables and energy storage. Connecting on-site renewables and energy storage between homes forms a sustainable microgrid that is capable of generating, storing, and sharing electricity to balance local generation and consumption in residential areas. In this talk, I will present two pieces of our work in this area. The first work targets at minimizing the electricity cost from a utility company for a microgrid under different market-based TOU pricing models. This work is selected as the best paper runners up at BuildSys 2014. The goals of the second work are real-time energy data gathering, compression, and recovery based on unique features in the energy consumption patterns. In the end of the talk, I will also briefly introduce some of my latest work in indoor localization, networking, and smart health.

Ting Zhu is an assistant professor in the CSEE at UMBC. He received the Computing Innovation Fellowship in 2010. His papers have been selected in the best paper award finalist in multiple conferences (i.e., SenSys ’10, e-Energy ’13, and BuildSys ’14). He has a broad research interest in areas such as internet of things, energy, networking, systems, big data, and security. He is looking for undergraduate, Master and PhD students to work in the above areas.

Hosts: Professors Fow-Sen Choa (Sorry, you need javascript to view this email address. ) and Alan T. Sherman (Sorry, you need javascript to view this email address. )

The UMBC CSEE Seminar Series Presents

Addressing Energy and Big Data
Challenges in Microgrids

Prof. Ting Zhu, UMBC

1-2pm Friday, Dec 4, 2015, ITE 325B

Buildings account for over 75% of the electricity consumption in the United States. To reduce electricity usage and peak demand, many utility companies are introducing market-based time-of-use (TOU) pricing models. In parallel, government programs that increase the fraction of renewable energy are incentivizing residential consumers to adopt on-site renewables and energy storage. Connecting on-site renewables and energy storage between homes forms a sustainable microgrid that is capable of generating, storing, and sharing electricity to balance local generation and consumption in residential areas. In this talk, I will present two pieces of our work in this area. The first work targets at minimizing the electricity cost from a utility company for a microgrid under different market-based TOU pricing models. This work is selected as the best paper runners up at BuildSys 2014. The goals of the second work are real-time energy data gathering, compression, and recovery based on unique features in the energy consumption patterns. In the end of the talk, I will also briefly introduce some of my latest work in indoor localization, networking, and smart health.

Ting Zhu is an assistant professor in the CSEE at UMBC. He received the Computing Innovation Fellowship in 2010. His papers have been selected in the best paper award finalist in multiple conferences (i.e., SenSys ’10, e-Energy ’13, and BuildSys ’14). He has a broad research interest in areas such as internet of things, energy, networking, systems, big data, and security. He is looking for undergraduate, Master and PhD students to work in the above areas.

Hosts: Professors Fow-Sen Choa (Sorry, you need javascript to view this email address. ) and Alan T. Sherman (Sorry, you need javascript to view this email address. )

The US Navy Summer 2016  Internship Program is back and recruiting UMBC Students! 

All UMBC students must apply through USA jobs for the Department of the Navy Summer Pathways Intern Program by December 10.

https://www.usajobs.gov/GetJob/ViewDetails/422956400

Additional information can be found below:

The US Navy has partnered with UMBC to specifically hire multiple interns for 3 different Summer 2016 programs: Fleet Cyber Command Intern, Navy Cyber Warfare Development Group Intern, and Navy Information Operations Command Intern. Position descriptions and brochures are listed below. 

Summer 2016 Fleet Cyber Command Intern 

Brochure

Longer Description

All Policy, Business, Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math Majors Encouraged to Apply

Summer 2016 Navy Cyber Warfare Development Group Intern 

Brochure

Longer Description

All Technical Majors Encouraged to Apply (CS, CE, IS, BTA, EE, Cyber, and Math)

Summer 2016 Navy Information Operations Command Intern 

Brochure
Longer Description

All Technical Majors Encouraged to Apply (CS, CE, IS, BTA, EE, Engineering, Cyber, and Math)

For additional questions or information, please contact USFF_FCC_C10F_NSAH_INTERNSHIP@navy.mil