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CECS’s Alvaro Monge Completes Google Faculty in Residence Summer Program

Graduating computer science students are all too familiar with the technical interview, where they’re asked to solve a problem on a whiteboard to demonstrate why they might be a useful addition to the team. However, that approach is in sharp contrast to the usual college lectures, where students sit quietly as professors click through their slide decks.

That will now change—at least in some of Professor Alvaro Monge’s computer science classes—thanks to his newfound experience with project-based learning.

Monge was one of 21 faculty from 20 U.S. institutions serving underrepresented students who participated in Google’s Faculty in Residence program this summer. The four-week program in Mountain View, Calif., offered an immersive learning experience to explore hands-on, project-based learning workshops. Continue reading “CECS’s Alvaro Monge Completes Google Faculty in Residence Summer Program”

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Professional Development Speaker Series: Working as a Google Engineer

If you want to know the questions that Google interviewers ask, don’t believe the dozens of books and blog posts written on the subject. Because the minute an interview question is found to be published, it’s added to the list of banned questions, says Google software engineer Chris Clark, who was at CSULB Tuesday to talk about what it’s like to be an engineer at Google.

Clark was the top computer science student in his class at UCLA, where he double majored in applied mathematics. He won a Hewlett-Packard scholarship that guaranteed him three internships at the company.

But after completing his first summer internship there, he declined a second one in favor of internships at Xerox and then Microsoft. After his 2008 graduation, Microsoft hired him full-time. Seven years ago, he was recruited by Google.

The search engine giant, said Clark, “is very good at empowering every engineer.” The company’s open environment and support of its employees is legendary, as are its kitchens.

Clark said the micro-kitchens serve a purpose in addition to keeping employees in snacks, refreshments, and meals. “They foster communication with other people. You might go to pick up a water and overhear someone trying to solve a technical problem and end up in a conversation,” he said. Continue reading “Professional Development Speaker Series: Working as a Google Engineer”

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Google Offers CECS Students Advice for Surviving a Technical Interview

It’s the subject of numerous books, blog posts, and tutorials: How to get hired at Google. On Thursday, CSULB Computer Engineering & Computer Science students had a chance to get the inside track on how to join a company that’s long been seen as a top workplace for tech talent.

Sponsored by the CSULB Career Center and the CECS Department, the workshop drew about 200 computer science and engineering students who heard from a trio of Googlers about “20 percent time,” social groups and “the Google 15.”

“Google would be an amazing place to work,” said Aimee Threlkeld, a computer engineering senior who is interning with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena and has already applied at Google. With an interest in embedded systems, Threlkeld was hoping that the workshop would help her clear her technical interview in the event she got a callback. Continue reading “Google Offers CECS Students Advice for Surviving a Technical Interview”