Learn It, Girl

I am a person who loves meeting new people, discussing tech, overflowing ideas and am a Fooodie (of Course). So, it was in March this year (2017), that I got to know about Learn It Girl and the concept seemed too good i.e you can work on your own idea under the guidance of a mentor. Sounds great? Yes, indeed! So, I contacted them and asked about the next edition registration (this is the 3rd edition), and they were too humble to answer all my queries. It was in August, that the registrations started and the only idea I could think of that time was regarding depression. This is no less than a disease and needs addressing.

And hence I brainstored into how can I approach this problem and give some efficient results. I thought of developing a game, a maze game, where users would be directed to some motivational video and quotes, every time they get stuck in the maze. I went ahead with this idea, and worked out a timeline for 3 months.

• Regarding the application, there are two fields which keep a lot of importance:

1. The project Idea
2. The timeline for the 3 months of the program. You can learn more about it here:https://www.learnitgirl.com/

wohoo! One of 129, I was over cloud nine.

The application process is itself a learning and self evoking process. It let’s you brainstorm an idea that you are passionate about or a technology stack that interests you or a specific language that you want to learn, it makes you focus on the things that matter to you.

So, after the results for Learn IT Girl were announced in October, I was super excited to work on the project and the tech stack that I was passionate about and on cloud nine when I got to know that only 129 girls from all over the world were selected for this program and I was one of them. But, this was just the beginning of the breath taking journey that lay ahead:)

It’s a twelve week program where I worked with my mentor to develop a Django based web application to classify tweets and analyze depression using Machine learning.

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The Challenges:

The first and foremost challenge was the idea itself because I had initially had the idea of a game in mind to fight depression using Django but it had to be tweaked. So we researched and then decided to make a tweet sentiment analysis system using Machine learning and Django as framework.

The next challenge was to work out the timeline for the entire project again but this time more practically and clearly. So I proposed a timeline to my mentor and then he suggested the changes and then this process continued till we had a proper schedule for those 12 precious weeks keeping in mind all the factors.

After we crafted out our timeline, we worked on tasks and discussed them every day or two. Here’s how we worked:

• First few weeks, say 5, we worked on machine learning basics and how it can be implemented, so that I have a solid grasp of the concepts.

• Then, we went on to work on the project, further dividing it into tasks like:

1) Getting data from twitter using tweepy

2) Pre-processing the data

3) Applying different machine learning algorithms in order to find the one which gives the best accuracy

4) Working on the website to show the relative rates of depression

 After the completion of the program, comes the evaluation time, when the LITG team evaluates your work and tells whether you passed the program or failed. Here’s the certificate I got on completion of the evaluation: litgcertificate

This experience didn’t only help me become stronger technically, but also taught the art of working together, respecting each other’s time and commitments and coming together to work out problems. I’m really grateful to Learn It, Girl for this opportunity and would like to contribute to the initiative in any way possible.

Keep calm and code on!