student stories

Student Story: Gabriella Opens the Door for a Tech Career After High School with Udacity

Gabriella Hawkes — a 17-year-old high school senior — has been preparing for a career in tech since she was 13 years old. What started out as a hobby, soon became her passion and now there’s no going back. 

“I want to learn everything about coding,” she said. She has already completed many online courses and two Udacity Nanodegree programs. 

She took her first Nanodegree program — Android Basics — at the age of 13, which she completed in the two month summer break from school. “I enrolled for my second Nanodegree program in Android Development during the COVID-19 quarantine period. I had no school to go to and could easily devote time to upskilling myself,” she said.

Since then she has been able to work on two projects. “One was a local company in Huntsville, AL where I helped them with their website and streamlined their job application process for prospective employees. The other was a company in New York where I helped them to develop a better database to help the CEO understand their supply chain management and current financials,” she added.

Moreover,  she recently won the NCWIT award and her state’s science fair where she created a class schedule optimizer for school staff.

Watch her story here:

Start Your Career in Android Development Now!

If Android development is on your mind then enroll now in the Android Basics Nanodegree program or Android Kotlin Development Nanodegree program now. 

Ritika Pradhan
Ritika Pradhan
Ritika is the Content Manager at Udacity and is passionate about bringing inspirational student stories to light. When not talking to the amazing Udacity students, she can be found reading an article or watching a video on the internet.