TA Spotlight: Neil Patel

Image

Neil Patel is a TA for CS 6515: Intro to Graduate Algorithms. Keep reading to learn more about Neil!

What do you do professionally?

Professionally I am a software engineer at Amazon AWS working on Just Walk Out technology. I get to work on some pretty cool things that change the status quo on how customers shop in brick-and-mortar stores. Prior to that I did both my BS and MS at Georgia Tech.

Why do you TA for OMSCS?

I have always enjoyed helping others and I think TAs play an important role especially in online courses. A lot of TAs have helped me when I was a student, so I wanted to do the same and pay it forward. The course I TA for, CS 6515: Intro to Graduate Algorithms, has some really fundamental material that would benefit any student pursuing an MS in CS, which is another motivator.

What is your advice for future OMSCS students?

Here are some pieces of advice I would give:

1. Everyone has their own journey. Don’t feel obligated to take two courses a semester or take a course every semester to feel "ahead" or "on track".
2. Lean on peers and course staff. Even though OMSCS is an online degree, that doesn’t mean you have to learn everything on your own. Ask questions and engage with others—you may end up taking classes together and staying in touch after graduating.

What's your preferred programming language, and why?

My favorite non-coding language is LaTeX. The elegance of documents you can make with LaTeX is amazing. It takes some time to get used to, but it is well worth it. For creating software, Python would be my favorite because of its versatility and ease of use.

Find Neil on...

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/neilhpatel1/