Acing the MLH Fellowship selection rounds

#opensource #beginners #productivity #programming

Since my selection, I have received a lot of queries regarding my MLH Fellowship journey and tips and tricks to get into the fellowship. Here, is an attempt to answer those queries and express my gratitude to this amazing program.

The start for me 🙈

The first hackathon which I took part in was Hack The Mountains which was powered by MLH. I was in my sophomore year when I first came to know about MLH and then it took me another 6 months to know about the MLH Fellowship. But don't worry, you don't have to wait that long!🙈

How MLH Fellowship started 🧐

Due to the pandemic, many students in the community lost their internships and jobs. So, MLH launched an educational program called MLH fellowship to help student developers get hands-on experience. The MLH Fellowship is a remote internship alternative for aspiring technologists. You can spend 12 weeks for main fellowship or 3 weeks for prep fellowship while building your skills by collaborating on real-world projects. The fellowship is powered by GitHub, Meta, Adobe, AWS, American Express, Indeed and many other industry players.

The Application Process ✨

The first step is to check if you're eligible for the fellowship which you can check from here. Once you are done, you can proceed to the initial application. From this point onwards, I'll be giving a lot of tips and tricks that are solely based on my thoughts and experience.

The initial application tests you both technically and intellectually. You will be asked to submit a code sample, and I would recommend you focus more on the quality of the project because you will be asked questions based on it in the following interviews. You must make sure not to submit someone else's code. The project you submit should be unique in terms of idea or implementation. Submitting one file code or algorithm implementation of a particular DSA problem would not be recommended. It is NOT necessary to submit a project in the application if you have an awesome Pull Request, it works. The admission team is more interested in knowing what you have learned in the process and how it is unique. A lot of people wanted to know the project I had submitted so here you go, to know more about it refer here.

Aniket762 / playground

Play around with code while we make sure you aren't lost!

Playground

In India, more than 95% of schools don't allow smartphones in class. Being a Computer Science teacher becomes very difficult as it is nearly impossible to check the handwritten code of each student line by line. Also talking in India, in most schools, the students don't have the privilege to have one computer each for them so that they can run their code on their own. So it becomes a nightmare for the teacher as they might have to manually type each code of each student and run it or take the risk of missing out on bugs. So we came up with Playground to make this job easier. Another reason for creating Playground was that once we entered college we understood the importance of coding. Coding not only helps you in a Software job but also helps increase logical reasoning and problem-solving ability. But many students don't have…

View on GitHub

The code sample shows your technical expertise and the behavioural questions focus on showing your interest in the program and your enthusiasm for the community.

Break down the essay questions and write things that show your interest in the program, what you are bringing to the table, what makes you different, and similar experiences if you had any. Make sure your answers show a lot of enthusiasm and answers the question why you should be selected out of all the candidates. After 2 to 3 edits of your answers, I am sure you can make it to the interviews. Jumping straight to the phone screen round.

Phone screen round 📱

Make sure you have proper audio, video, and internet connection. The interview starts with basic eligibility questions and then takes you to more generalised questions. Make sure to convey the reason why you want to be in this program and answer every question with confidence. Remember, you know it's a good interview when it feels less like an interview and more like a conversation. Phone screening round is more like an HR round which may also include some layered tech questions such as the project which you are most proud of and why. Preparing HR questions can be at times tricky I would suggest checking out DanLok's YT. Once you pass this interview, you move on to the last and final round, the technical round!

Technical round 🧑‍💻

This is the most important round and decides if you will be a fellow or not. The technical round has no HR question and it will be a code conversation as the team calls it. First, you are asked to share you screen and give a demo of the project you submitted. Then you would be asked to go through the code and explain some parts of it while also answering some questions based on the code. You need NOT write any code while sharing your screen, but you should know every line properly along with the reasons why you are using a particular module or tech stack. For example, you submitted a simple blogging website and used NextJS for the front-end, so you might face questions ranging from the reason for choosing Next over any another framework to complex conceptual questions in the area depending upon the interviewer. You might be asked your future plans with the code sample like how you plan to scale your application or what new features you would like to add. So make sure to know each and every thing about your project.

Conclusion 🤲

I have worked in several organisations starting from leading a campus club to mid-range product-based startups and also got the opportunity to work with one of the finest tech companies in the world. Relating those with my MLH interviews, it felt pretty easy and comfortable, because of a couple of reasons:

MLH has one of the most amazing sets of interviewers who will make you very comfortable the moment the interview starts.
The questions asked in the interviews are not on business logic or to trap you, all they want is to check your enthusiasm for technology and the entire program.
The technical interviews varies depending upon the interviewer and the project. Talking about my experience, the questions I faced were easy for me. Since it was my project and I knew every single line in it, so I was very confident with every question asked. Moreover, I did a couple of mock interviews with Sumana Basu which helped me gain a lot of confidence and is something I would highly recommend.

So that's all the tips from my side. If you still have any queries or need any help with the application, feel free to reach me out on LinkedIn or drop a comment 💕

Lastly, a huge shoutout to the 14 highly enthusiastic coders I met during the fellowship! 🥳

Top comments (13)

Archana Dash • Feb 5 '22

Great blog !!!
Can u pls share something about the level of project required to get into MLH prep ?

Aniket Pal • Feb 6 '22

Hey @archanadash thanks a lot.

There is no such level , try to build a project which is unique even if that's something funky it works. The admission team as per my understanding wants to test your skills and the depth of knowledge you have. Make sure to submit a project with multiple directories and code that is self explanatory as much as possible. Hope this helps.

Cheers!