Software QA Internships at Portnov Computer School

April 2011 is just about to end. Today we looked at the statistics of Internship Placement. The numbers are pretty good: in the year 2011 (first four months) we placed 86 graduates as interns. Considering that the school has around 250 students a year the number is just right.

One comment I should make based on what we are experiencing some times: if it takes an approval of your spouse to accept an internship, please, get that approval before you go to an interview, not after.

Many managers would consider that situation (not excited, not immediately accepting) as having lack of interest and they will turn to people who express their enthusiasm about the offer.

What it takes to get the first job in Software QA

Mr. Roman Savinkov who works as QA Architect for PayPal in his book (published in 2008) says literally the following:

Here is my position: for your first job in testing you must:
- Know how to use email and a Web browser
- Be familiar with black box testing techniques (Boundary Values, etc.)
- Be familiar with the main concepts of test cases, SDLC, and bug tracking

I was told many times that requirements are growing and to start your career in Software QA you have to know much more than what we teach in Portnov Computer School. Well, obviously there is more than one opinion on the matter.

Lots of news in April

Since April 1 Sofia has placed 14 graduates as QA interns, which is very good. We have now more requests for interns than we have resumes available. The process is a bit slower now compare to a month ago because we implemented mandatory mock interviews and internship clearance interview to make sure the prospective interns are able to talk about the study projects they did in the school, what they tested and how exactly they tested the software.

In April we are launching first two groups with new course and fee structure. More value comes at a higher cost, but so far the enrollment is at the same level as before.

We are processing the the Student Feedback forms, which we collected 2 weeks ago. Lots of changes are coming as a response to your requests.
- the campus is now tobacco free zone with smoking prohibited within the training session time frame
- we are adding more focus and more hours to Technology curriculum in SQA Express class
- students will know in advance the issues covered in all the sessions
- we created Downloads page with all the tools used in the school, so you cab install them on your laptops BEFORE the class, not during the class
- we are working on writing down all the essential procedures so students have better idea of how the program works, what are the internship requirements and prerequisites, expectations, quizzes and so on.