Hi Josoe, Thank you for sharing your experience with us. Tell us a little about yourself to our readers?

I am an Electronic Engineer, currently working as a software developer in a government institution (Servicio de Impuestos Nacionales de Bolivia). I also belong to a telecommunications research amateur group.

Tell us more about AccessPlus and how it helps you with professional development?

The Access Plus volunteer program was oriented to discover our abilities to work as a team, to always give the best of ourselves and also it helps us to create a network with national and international organizations.

At Asha Hope Amanaki, what were your roles and responsibilities as a volunteer in the team?

My role during the internship was the facilitator, I was in charge of gathering all the ideas and advice of the team to perform the requirements of the organization. At the beginning we started to learn how to create and edit a WordPress  website, so after that we updated some functionalities, adjusted and improved some styles of Asha Hope Amanaki’s website.

For students interested in participating with us, what would you say, you learnt from this opportunity?

I did learn how to face a problem from different points of view and combine ideas from all of the group to obtain a much better solution. I also learn a lot from the expertise and abilities of my team Daniela and Angela, they are great friends. Now I can say that we can create our own WordPress website to share our hobbies and knowledge on the internet.

Since this was a remote opportunity, what would you say were the biggest advantages and disadvantages?

Since all of us were from different Time Zones, including the team at Asha Hope Amanaki, sometimes it was difficult to coordinate our meetings. We had to find a means of communication that worked for all and we created a Whatsapp group to streamline communications. 

As this was an opportunity with an organization based in the United States, it gave us an opportunity to communicate in English and practice our communications skills as we presented our findings and corresponding solutions. We were connected to people from different parts of the world and since we all had to work in a team, it provided great experience to work together as  team. 

Are there any final thoughts you would like to share with our audience?

This opportunity helped me to grow in my career and I’m sure it will help to find new opportunities outside of my country. Finally I want to thank Srilekhya, who was our mentor, for being with us during the internship and helping us to accomplish all the requirements of the organizations in a timely manner.