It’s been quite a ride. 4 years, many people met, few people kept. I started my Bachelor’s as a young, stupid boy and ended up being an older, (very) slightly less stupid boy. What has happened in such a long-ish time?
Roadmap
The start of an era
My first year was the worst by far. After a personal rollercoaster and coming from living isolated from humanity in the countryside, I went to a new city to start studying engineering. Everything was scary, but it was also new. First semester was hard as rock: tons of math and tons of adaptations to this new way of living. Met a few people and didn’t quite know what I was doing, but I was there anyways, showing up every day.
Second semester was a better ride. Grinded so hard I ended up acing all of the subjects, and I was finally fairly adapted - at least a bit more than the first couple of months. I can say that helped with the acing thing.
The continuation of the era
Second year was more or less the same as the second semester of the first. Trying my best, learning a lot and establishing my relationship with the JAJER team: Juanma, Artur, Jorge, Edu and me, Rubén. They are the ones that have held me through this path, and the people with which I did every group project. Can say I was astonishingly lucky: I graduated with above-average results and they are still close colleagues (which I guess it’s not that common, sadly). Obviously we had our “rifirrafes”, but they’ve never been a big deal.
Great people overall, if you are a hiring manager and/or an employer, I recommend you hire them ASAP. They probably will get out of stock soon.
OMG, things are changing?
Finally, something is changing. The extremely brief year-description you have just read was extremely stereotypical, but this year new, exciting things happened. JAJER was expanding, we onboarded two new members, expanding to JAJERDA: David and Alesuito. Alesuito was known by two members, and David knew Alesuito… We got along quickly and decided they were worthy of our blessing to join the organization.
And the most incredible thing of all is that an eighth member was cooking its way in: María. We can say she ended up having a special place in someone’s heart.
JAJERDA was also starting to take external competitions and events more seriously: we had a bit more knowledge, and agentic AI was breaking in the tech environment, so curious and brave we went all in to every event and hackathon available. Our success was relative and, most likely, mid. More or less won something, but participated in everything. Participation is what matters, right?
The rest was ok: already adapted, uni made us work a lot but marks were good, learnt a lot, yada yada yada, and summer again.
Uni is not everything
Fourth year. Internships incoming, already thinking about work. Did some interviews (with no intention of working, just to try how it is) during summer and surprisingly they went pretty well. Confident and purposeful, the last year started :)
María was accepted into the organization by the invitation of Eduardo, a founder of the original JAJER team. With every unit onboarded, finally JAJERDAM was formally established: the final, elite organization of academic excellence.
The final year of our BSc was a bit different because we had afternoon classes. It was kind of difficult at first, specially first semester, but people started to slowly go less and less to class… So, in the end, it was a comforting experience. We didn’t feel guilty because almost no one went to class.
And internships came. Surprisingly, every member of JAJERDAM started working where they wanted to and everyone was happy. I started at Plytix and it felt like a dream: Claude Code, free food and an AI project to develop from scratch. Couldn’t have been better.
JAJERDAM was also thriving: we got along surprisingly well, and everyone was grinding its own thing. But not everything can be shiny and beautiful.
The downfall
No one was hired after the internships. Not because we weren’t great, but because there was no need for more juniors right now. AI + summer was a strong enough combo to knock out our hopes of getting our first full-time job right after the internships.
The (partial) rise
Submerged in sadness, we needed to lock in to finish our thesis. We were running out of time, but, once again, JAJERDAM struck a big W and everyone finished their thesis on time.
During this period, some of the members started their job search and some were lucky enough to get interviews and even jobs! Eduardo locked in an offer for a full-time position somewhere I cannot disclose (I signed a NDA for this) and I got a full-time offer at Prima Assicurazioni. If I’m being honest, I cannot be happier about the outcome. And curiously, I went from a purple P to another 🟪
Graduated, now what?
New beginnings
Now, with our academic records full and our hopes recharged, we are starting our new lives. We have lived these years with our heads tucked in our bubble, and now we have to start applying our knowledge to the real world. Scary, right?
We have gone through worse. I’m the kind of guy who thinks that, in the long term, life can only get better. But even though everyone says that the best is just starting, it is hard to get my head around changing the routine I’ve followed for most of my life. It’s a tough mindset shift.
But we will all get through it. Because no one finishes an engineering degree to stop now. The grind must keep going, and, most importantly: don’t let yourself run out of electricity.
Keeping the lights on
Electricity is not free. We need to recharge it. And how can we do it? By spending time with those we love (friends, family, partner), by doing things we love, and by trying to be good to each other. Sounds cliché, but it’s the truth. No one is around forever (not even ourselves), so try to squeeze every moment of it.
And speaking of the people who kept my battery charged through all of this: a massive, heartfelt thank you to the entire JAJERDAM crew. You guys turned hours of frustrating group projects, endless grinds, and hard-fought wins and losses into the absolute best four years of my life. I’m leaving university with a degree, a bunch of knowledge, and seven great friends.
A few words for those still in the trenches
If you are just starting your degree or are currently stuck in the middle of it, here is my unsolicited advice to survive (and thrive):
- Find your crew early: You can’t carry the weight of an engineering degree alone. Find people who challenge you, make you laugh, and won’t let you quit when “TALF” (Automata Theory and Formal Languages) gets brutal.
- Show up every day… but only when it’s worth it: Consistency is key to staying in the loop and keeping up with the momentum, especially early on. But you also need to play it smart. Go to class to stay in the game, but the exact moment a lecture becomes completely inefficient and you know you will be ten times more productive from your room, just stay home. Optimize your time; don’t sit through a useless class just out of guilt.
- Look beyond the classroom: Uni gives you the foundation, but events, hackathons, and messing around with new tech (like agentic AI) give you the edge. Go out there, participate, and don’t be afraid to finish “mid”. Experience is the real trophy.
- Get an internship as soon as you can: It completely changes your perspective on what you are learning and prepares you for the real world far better than any lecture ever could.
The end… For now
As you probably noticed by some of my phrasing, English is not my first language. I did my absolute best writing this, and if you made it all the way to the end…
Thanks for reading.