CS 373 Spring 2021: Kent Hansen

• Where did you grow up?

I grew up in Cedar Park, Texas, a suburb just north of Austin. Because I had three older siblings who went to UT, I spent a lot of time around campus and other parts of Austin growing up.

• What high school did you attend?

I went to Leander High School, a fairly large public school. One thing I appreciated about my high school was being able to participate in the IB program which gave me a lot of writing, reading, and research skills which have been very useful in college.

• Why did you come to UT?

I came to UT because it was familiar to me growing up, because I enjoyed the culture, size, and diversity, and because I knew it was a great place to go to study computer science.

• Why are you majoring in CS?

I’m majoring in CS because I love the potential which learning to code and build useful things has for solving interesting and pressing problems in the world. It gives me the skills and versatility to contribute to all kinds of fields and endeavors.

• Why are you in this class?

I’m taking this class because of the reputation it has for providing practical and useful experience learning and working with software development tools and practices. I also took OOP last semester and really enjoyed the format and how much I learned so I’m looking forward to learning some new skills.

• What are your expectations of this class?

For the parts of the class outside of the main project, I am expecting something similar to OOP in terms of structure. For the project I am expecting to have a lot of work but to learn a huge amount about web development and collaboration with a team.

• How much Javascript/Python/SQL/Web programming do you already know?

Although I haven’t created anything substantial, I have a fair amount of experience with Javascript (and React specifically) and Python as well as writing backends in Node and Flask from learning and work that I’ve done on my own over the past year. I have a fair amount of experience with Python through my job, although mostly with a focus on data analysis. I know less about SQL although I’ve interacted with it superficially. I have some experience writing and using REST APIs as well.

• How did you like the two lectures?

I enjoyed the first two lectures, and even though I learned about Docker in OOP going over it again was super helpful.

• How did you feel about the cold calling?

I appreciate the cold calling format because it ensures that more of the class is on the same page and makes you more motivated to follow along and understand the content.

• What made you happy this week?

I’ve been trying to get out and walk more this week after being mostly sedentary for months now and so far it’s going pretty well so I hope I can keep that up.