Geeking Out with Adriana Villela

Geeking Out LIVE: The One Where We Geek Out on Slaying the Vibes

Episode Summary

GenZ are in a unique position in the Age of AI, because they are coming up "AI native"...or are they? Join us for a special LIVE episode of Geeking Out, in which host Adriana Villela speaks with four GenZ-ers to get their perspectives on how AI is disrupting software development, and their future careers. Featuring Divyasha Pahuja, Stella Gu, Amrithaa Logeswaran, and Rachelle De Man.

Episode Notes

Key Takeaways

A great way to use AI is to use it to do all the mundane tasks for you (e.g. formatting code)
When you tell AI to do something for you, you're slightly losing the ability to do it yourself.
When using AI, trust, but verify.
Don't use AI for everything, because it takes away from why you're doing the project in the first place.
Using AI to help you code makes things possible that you couldn't have necessarily done on your own. It brings to life ideas that have been in the back burner.
GenZ-ers don't want AI to agree with them. They a partner challenge and brainstorm with, just as another human would.
AI takes away the opportunities and joys of overcoming challenges in coding.
There are higher expectations in terms of productivity now that AI-assisted development is a thing, and GenZ is feeling the pressure!
We are at risk of losing our critical thinking skills due to over-reliance on AI.
Many university course curricula are out of date, as they have not kept pace with AI, leaving students unprepared and without proper direction on how to use it in the workplace.
Many universities aren't sure of how to integrate AI in their curricula in an effective manner.
Final exams are one way to determine whether or not you've mastered the course work, or just got by during the school year by using AI to do most of the work for you.
What's acceptable use of AI in non-engineering classes, such as visual arts, for example?
AI slop cleanup is a real job now!
Today's juniors recognize that they will be tomorrow's seniors. Therefore, they need employers to provide them with mentorship from seniors to help them succeed, and they need time to learn the fundamentals.
It's no longer about writing code; system design is a crucial skill in today's job market.
Words of wisdom: You need a well-rounded view and understanding of AI, as be intentional about how you use it. Be curious!

About our guests

Divyasha Pahuja

Divyasha Pahuja is a GenZ AI engineer, multimodal ML researcher, and four-time peer-reviewed author at ACM/IEEE and Springer — someone whose career started before ChatGPT shipped and accelerated alongside it. She's had quite a journey: software engineer (back when LLMs weren't a household phrase), then back to school, then ML researcher, and now sitting at the cusp of both as an AI engineer.

Off the keyboard, she's spent the last few years with Feeding India leading a digital campaign team, distributing meals, and building recurring partnerships with local NGOs and old age homes.

Outside of all that, she loves playing badminton, is a self-admitted sore loser, has a soft spot for cats, coffee shops and Netflix because who doesn't, and is just starting an AI community at @un__prompted — say hi if you want to be there early.

Find Divyasha on:

Stella Gu

Stella Gu is an early-career software engineer with past experience at Manulife and Huawei. She has explored a variety of roles within software engineering, including backend systems and data infrastructure. She enjoys working directly with code, turning ideas into meaningful software. Outside of tech, Stella can be found playing sports ⛷️🏐, exploring new food spots, and capturing moments on her phone.

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Amrithaa Logeswaran

Amritha is a second-year Integrated Engineering student at the University of Western Ontario, passionate about building inclusive communities and amplifying student voices. Last year, she served as a First-Year Representative with the Undergraduate Engineering Society (UES), where she discovered how much I love connecting with people and created space for everyone to feel included and supported.

She's realized I’m just as passionate about supporting student life as I am about studying engineering. Whether it’s through leadership roles or one-on-one conversations, she loves building community and helping students feel like they truly belong.

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Rachelle De Man

Rachelle De Man is a young software engineer with experience working at companies like Google, Okta and 1Password. She has an interest in all things web, primarily with accessibility, security, and testing. She’s passionate about hackathons, being a longtime volunteer and attendee. In her off hours, Rachelle enjoys crocheting, games, and photographing nature.

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Find Geeking Out on

All of our social channels are on bio.site/geekingout
All of Adriana's social channels are on bio.site/adrianavillela

Chapters

00:08 Intro
01:38 Guest intros
03:59 What was your first programming language?
08:22 What was your first experience with AI-assisted coding?
21:57 Are GenZ-ers better positioned as being more "AI-native"?
27:50 What are expectations around AI usage in school?
45:20 What kind of support do you want from employers for success in an AI world?
56:36 Final words of wisdom
59:31 Peace out and geek out