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MUM Student Intern Wins Amazon Award

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MUM Student Intern Wins Amazon Award

In professional sports, top performing first-year athletes receive a lot of public attention. In the IT industry, Amazon has a top “rookie” performer in Amarbayar (Amar) Amarsanaa.

In his first year working for Amazon Fulfillment Technologies DevOps (Development Operations) team, Amar was named “Associate of the Month” in recognition of his contribution to, and impact on one of the Software Development Engineer (SDE) teams he was supporting when he reduced their operating issues by 86%. He also was promoted to DevOps IV!

According to Amar, “Operational excellence is something my employer takes seriously, as we (Amazon) continue to strive to be the earth’s most customer-centric company. We don’t stop at just innovating, building and launching — but we also make sure our services are optimized, efficient, reliable, available and accurate. In executing these plans, we identify manual, repetitive work and take the initiative to automate it to save our and others’ time.”

Recently, Amar teamed up with another engineer on his team to automate the process of data consolidation, which had been done manually by engineers. This automated process is now used by engineers, SDE teams and managers to drive their teams’ service operational excellence. The automation saves 2-3 hours per engineer, per week, and it is widely used by 12+ teams, and counting. During the October 2016 organization meeting, including teams from the US, Canada and India, Amazon leadership recognized their effort, and awarded Amar and his colleague the honorable, “Operational Excellence” award. Quite an honor for a “rookie!”

International Educational Background

Amar has always enjoyed traveling. He left his native Mongolia at 14 to attend an English-speaking high school in Poland, and later enrolled in a U.S. university where he graduated on the Dean’s List with a bachelor’s degree in computer science. The university President named him Outstanding Student of the Year. During this time he also excelled in playing piano and guitar.

After college, Amar was named Employee of the Year at a software company in North Dakota, and won a photography award. As the following photos illustrate, Amar is a talented and accomplished photographer with a sense of humor!

Later, while studying in a graduate computer networking program in Korea, he learned about the MUM Master’s in Computer Science. Amar was attracted by the curriculum, healthful diet and quality living conditions at MUM.

Academics at MUM

Amar applied to our Computer Professionals (ComPro) Program and began classes at MUM in June 2014, where he also became a resident advisor, and Computer Science representative to the MUM student association.

According to Amar, “The quality of the education offered in the ComPro program is outstanding. Not only do the faculty have remarkable industry backgrounds, but they are always up-to-date on the newest technologies, so that students can be assured they are learning the best from the best.

In addition, team projects bring up a great opportunity for students to collaborate, solve real-world problems, present their solutions to meet extremely high requirements imposed by the professors — and at the end of the day, we come out with solid project experience, which helps in finding internships.”

Life on the MUM Campus

“Academically, the ComPro program sets high standards for its students. To support total student development, MUM provides a very comfortable and healthful living environment, so that students can take on the challenges of academic life when they are at their best. People talk about work-life balance, and I feel that the balance of academic work and life at MUM was perfect… this is what I enjoyed the most about living at MUM.”

Benefits of learning the Transcendental Meditation® Technique

“Another reason I chose MUM was the opportunity of doing the Transcendental Meditation technique (TM). TM is one of the fundamentals on which the university was built. It is a simple mental technique that relieves stress, improves thinking and creativity, and increases your energy level. I have a high respect for it. The biggest benefit of TM for me is that it helps me relax, and then have sharper focus on complex issues, resulting in comprehensive and satisfying solutions without stress,” says Amar.

Internship at Amazon & Life in the Seattle Area

After completing eight months of on-campus courses in Fairfield, Iowa, Amar was hired in 2015 to do his Curricular Practical Training (CPT) internship as a DevOps Engineer with Amazon Fulfillment Technologies in Seattle, Washington. He enjoys living in the Pacific Northwest, where he pursues his passion for natural outdoor environments, working out, photography, music, and social involvement in worthy causes.

Advice for Other Software Engineers

Amar enjoyed his time on our campus: “There are so many advantages at MUM. I feel extremely lucky and privileged to have had the opportunity to be a part of it: Low upfront cost, outstanding academic program, remarkable faculty and staff, opportunity to work with skilled professionals from other countries, a dedicated career strategies class (resume reviews, interview preps, mock-up interviews, job searching techniques), internal job fair network, organic meals, comfortable living environment, sports facilities, events, activities and clubs. And most notably, 99% placement rate for internships!”

“Therefore, I would definitely advise students and working professionals from around the world to take advantage of this great opportunity. Check out the admissions requirements, make sure you meet or exceed the requirements, and apply!

Be prepared to get challenged and be prepared to embrace all the positive outcomes you will get from the ComPro program. Also, for success at MUM and in the US, you need very good English skills!”

Future Plans

“I plan to continue developing myself personally and professionally. In addition to growing at Amazon, I hope to impact the world using technology to solve day-to-day problems that people face, and possibly starting a company with friends and/or business partners.”

“I will also continue participating in the same non-profit areas that I am part of today, to help the next generations of Mongolians achieve their personal and professional goals through coaching and mentoring. ”

Additional Appreciation

“I will be graduating this December. It has been a dynamic and rewarding ride since I became a ComPro student. One of my favorite courses was Advanced Software Development with Dr. Guthrie, because it has helped tremendously in my professional work.”

“I will be forever thankful for everyone I have met during my student life at MUM. I have made some wonderful, life-long friends in the beautiful natural MUM environment, and hope to participate in the commencement next spring to reconnect with my fellow ComPro students, faculty and friends. I will continue upholding the name of MUM and will always be a proud ComPro alumnus!”

Amar would like to thank his parents for their tireless and continuous support in every moment of his life, and for raising him to be who he is today. “Thanks mum and thanks dad!”

Note: Amar works at Amazon and the postings on this page are his own and don’t necessarily represent Amazon’s position.

Student Achieves Success

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Zheng Yang has a strong thirst for knowledge, and the desire to excel as an IT professional.

Prior to enrolling in our MSCS program, Zheng worked for about 2 years as a Software Engineer in mainland China. At that time he started looking for a graduate program combining academic learning and practical working opportunities. Once he heard about the MS in Computer Science for Computer Professionals at Maharishi University of Management, he applied and began his studies here in February 2010.

While still an MUM student, Zheng Yang has already achieved a number of laudable professional achievements. Following completion of his on-campus courses, Zheng interned at Snibbe Interactive in San Francisco as an Immersive Media Software Engineer. There he got the chance to work with Scott Snibbe, the pioneer of computer vision technology, who came up with the idea of “Gravilux.”

Microsoft Featured App: Gravilux

Gravilux is an interactive musical starfield visualizer: it’s a combination of music, animation, art, and science. As you touch the screen, gravity draws simulated stars to your fingertips. You can tease and twist the particles into galaxies, or explode them like a supernova. Color the stars by their speed, and make them dance. After making a version for IOS, Zheng was instrumental in making a version of Gravilux for Windows 8. Out of 50,000 apps in the Windows Store “Entertainment” category, Microsoft decided to feature Gravilux.

Wrote and Published Book

While working full time at Snibbe, Zheng was also completing distance education courses as part of his MUM MS program. On his own time, he wrote the book, Windows Phone 7 XNA Cookbook. Because there were no specific books about game programming for Windows Phone at the time, he wanted to share what he had learned. After 17 months of writing and editing, the book was published in cookbook style, offering solutions using a recipe-based approach. Each recipe contains detailed instructions followed by analysis of what was done in each step. The book was written for aspiring game programmers who have basic knowledge of C# and object-oriented programming, and want to create games for Windows Phone 7. Reviews have been quite positive.

Goals

Zheng Yang’s goals include making a video game engine that can provide realistic playing experiences, and developing a new art form called “Generative Art,” which creates computer generated music and painting. His MSCS program at MUM has been a big help in allowing Zheng to rethink the best practices for designing the architecture of game engines with efficient algorithms. He has been most stimulated by the Advanced Programming Design, Computer Graphics, and Algorithms courses at MUM.

Zheng especially appreciates the MUM block system of studying one course full-time each month, allowing for dedication and deep appreciation of each discipline. He finds the quiet and peaceful campus atmosphere ideal for calm, focused studying.

To assist other software developers in advancing their careers, Zheng advises people to work hard and keep learning. People should enjoy what they do, practice their skills every day, never give up, challenge themselves, manage time well, maintain discipline, and remain optimistic.

TM Practice

Zheng says that practicing the Transcendental Meditation® technique produces a calm, relaxed mind and enhances self-knowledge in a fast and noisy world, leading to greater patience and productivity.

Current Activities

At the beginning of April this year, Zheng returned to MUM to take two additional courses of great interest: (1) Mobile Device Programming, and (2) Enterprise Architecture. Because mobile programming with Android is one of the main streams in current technology, and because he only has experience on Windows Phone and IOS, Zheng is taking the Mobile programming course to learn Android programming.

Software Engineer, Student, and Scholar

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Our MSCS student interns work full-time in their professional IT positions. They also take required distance education courses. As a result, most students find little time left for any other activities. Mohamed Sobhy M.A. Farag is an exception. Not only is he working full-time as a Technical Consultant for the top IT consulting company in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and earning A’s in his distance education courses, but Mohamed has made the time to pursue a number of scholarly activities.

Mohamed was born in a small town in northern Egypt, and attended primary and high school in Saudi Arabia. By the time he finished high school, he was ranked sixth among the top ten students in Saudi Arabia. During this period Mohamed became inspired by computers, and he returned to Egypt to study Computer Science in Menoufia University, where he specialized on the architecture of computing machines and operating systems.

By third level at Menoufia University, Mohamed was listed on the FreeBSD contributor list. He got the opportunity to develop an approach for loading FreeBSD kernel modules at run time dynamically. As a result of this project, he was awarded a Google Summer of Code Prize. His interest reached to both the node structure level, and to the node communication level. By the fourth year at Menoufia University, he studied Computer networks and received CCNA Academy certificate (CISCO Certified Network Associate). In May 2011, he graduated with a grade of Excellent with Honor degree.

Recent Honors and Achievements

During 2010 and 2011, Mohamed received several honors:

  • First place in “Best Programming Project”, Renewable Energy Conference, Egypt, 2010.
  • Google Summer of Code Award, Google, 2010.
  • First place in “Best Programming Project”, Renewable Energy Conference, Egypt, 2011.
  • Top 20 Engineers in Egypt, 2011.
  • Technical Lead at ArabBSD project (December, 2010 – Present).
  • Organizer at Google Developer Group (January 2011 – Present).

Mohamed’s recent scholarly achievements:

  • August 2012: Mohamed published the article, “Multicore dynamic kernel modules attachment technique for kernel performance enhancement,” in the International Journal of Computer Science & Information Technology (IJCSIT), vol 4, no 4, under the Maharishi University of Management, Department of Computer Science.
  • December 2012: He published, “An enhanced run-time kernel visual debugger,” in the IEEE 8th International Computer Engineering Conference (ICENCO) Proceedings, also under the Maharishi University of Management, Department of Computer Science.
  • February 2013: Mohamed was formally invited to speak at the session on “The Emerging Mobile Applications and Services” at BIT’s 2nd Annual World Congress of Emerging InfoTech-2013, to be held June, 2013 in Dalian, China.
  • March 2013: Mohamed’s proposal, “Cryptology from Operating System Paradigm,” was accepted as a chapter for a new book discussing the importance of information security in a multidisciplinaric manner. In this context, “multidisciplinary” indicates the presentation of computer security topics in terms of other disciplines, i.e. introducing security in file systems, kernels or cloud instead of offering pure security topics. Currently, his chapter is being revised by several professors who specialize in computer security.
  • April 2013: He was invited to participate in the US Department of Defense “Cloud Computing & Assurance for Critical DoD Initiatives Conference” in Maryland.

Why attend MUM?

When asked why he chose Maharishi University of Management for his Masters degree in Computer Science, Mohamed replied, “The choice for graduate study depends on a student’s objective. The majority of programs miss the ability of tracking market needs. There’s a gap between the theoretical research and practical life. I can feel it in my new workplace where we have other universities’ Master’s students lacking the industrial qualities. From my perspective, MUM is one of the top places in preparing students with the required qualities and experiences for the US market. I gained the industrial experience indirectly during my on-campus studies at MUM, and have faced many situations in my job similar to what I had in course labs.”

Advantages of practicing the TM® technique

“The focus on self-development along with educational qualities is fascinating at MUM. Transcendental Meditation as a common self-development technique [practiced by all students, faculty and staff at MUM] helps me to listen to my inward capabilities, and to enhance my emotional stability.”

Future goals

Mohamed’s goals: “According to the rest and activity cycle, I’m planning to return to academic studies soon. I’m intending to study for a PhD to build and refine my systematic thinking and investigate new ways of problem solving.” He is considering MIT, Stanford and Carnegie-Melon for his PhD.

Advice for other Software Engineers

“Maharishi University of Management is one of the top programs which prepares students for top industrial positions in the US IT market. You should consider MUM if you want to be a leader in the IT world.”