Hi guys, this is my first blog post as an Outreachy intern and God willing, I hope to post more through the course of the internship (ends 3rd of March, 2020). I got to know about Outreachy when someone in a whatsapp group shared the link, this came at a time when I have been desperately seeking a software development internship so as to be able to apply my skills to real world project.

Reading the blog posts and tweets of former interns got me excited about contributing to Free and Open Source Software as well as opportunities that lie beyond the internship, their words of encouragement also motivated me to apply.

Going through the project list during the contribution phase the mUzima project stand out to me. The focus of muzima app on bettering health care provision through ICT resonated with me coming from a country where health care provision is not too great and heath information management is paper based and not sufficiently efficient. This hinders proper decision making when providing healthcare services. I was happy to work on a project that has been changing this narrative in Kenya and other parts of the world.

I did not have much confusion during the application process because I had mentors who communicated clearly and were always willing to clarify issues to me. The muzima wiki contained vital informaiton that I needed, and the github repository was helpful in providing important clues that I needed. When I was stuck I asked mentors for help and they provided guidelines on how to go about the things I needed to do.

My advice to anyone that is worried about applying to Outreachy is that there are lots of projects with different skills/language requirements that cater for everyone from beginner to experienced, select about two projects that interest you and speak to the mentors. Also study if the mentor responds to your enquiries and if they are willing to guide you because this also plays a major role in your chances. You can do it!