What does earning a Harvard degree mean to you?
Earning a Harvard degree has been a life-long goal. I started my master’s degree program in the field of government in 2020 during COVID, so it has been almost six years from my first course to graduation.
It meant embracing new challenges and making the most of the opportunities available, such as taking part in the Harvard Innovation Labs programming. I was also able to take two elective law courses taught by Harvard Law School professors, which was a meaningful experience without needing to attend full-time traditional LLM program. Another course was taught by an FBI special agent — another unique opportunity that only Harvard can provide.
How has your Harvard Extension School experience helped you throughout your career journey? How do you expect it to impact your next steps?
By leveraging my Harvard Extension School experience, I earned promotions to a management role in government. I am also able to get invited to interview for many more jobs than I could before, especially in higher level or specialized government roles. I can now confidently pursue further promotions or career changes to skilled government positions that were previously unattainable.
Describe a moment when you realized HES had changed your career opportunities or career path.
When I was participating in Harvard i-Labs during the last year of my master’s program, I was also being accepted to Meta’s Llama Startup Program at the same time. I found myself collaborating with and being part of technical meetings about AI start-up projects with Meta’s Llama Engineering Team and Amazon Web Services. I could keep up with the technical discussions and contribute my innovation and technical research to AI start-up project work without having any previous technical background in computer science or artificial intelligence. Both of these opportunities were thanks to Harvard.
Transformative.
