Sage Corps

Program Reviews

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Peter Wang
5/5
Yes, I recommend this program

Great experience at a Singapore social enterprise

The work was very rewarding and fun, I made a lot of very close friends in the Sage Corps cohort in Singapore. And the city of Singapore was the best of all - it was clean, safe, efficient, diverse and had so much to offer. And the Sage Corps staff was very helpful as well.

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Jonathan
5/5
Yes, I recommend this program

Biggest Takeaway

Growth and comfort rarely coexist. I warmed up to my very patient and intelligent roommate, Adam, immersed myself fully into CoCoon's ecosystem, backpacked through Hong Kong's mountains alone, and fell in love with the district's culture. For these wonderful events to happen, I left friends back in Chicago, lived with once a complete stranger, arrived to a country that silos me as a foreigner despite similar cultural roots, and embraced loneliness in a busy city. I now carry with me lessons learned then to my internship with Freshwater Advisors led by David Weinstein, Chicago's seriel entrepreneur. Then, I dream to jumpstart a traditional yoga studio and physical therapy clinic that integrates appropriate cutting-edge innovation to better my community's well-being.

What would you improve about this program?
More structure in orientation.
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Leland
5/5
Yes, I recommend this program

Sage Corps in Hong Kong

While initially hesitant about joining the program, as I would be joining it's second program ever, the interview process gave me more confidence in the program. The CEO, Matt Meltzer, was very supportive and dedicated to providing a quality experience tailored to my interest. As a chemistry major and a statistics minor, I was unsure if my skills would even be applicable to start-ups, let alone international ones. Instead, I was given a great opportunity that catered to my interests and pushed me out into the burgeoning field of data analytics.

The Internship:
I worked for The CloudMiner Ltd., a data-mining and financial services company targeting the commodities industry. During the Sage Corps interview process, I spoke to one of the co-founders, Dan Bloor, who talked to me on how I could apply my statistical knowledge to their business challenges. As a web based company, all the focus was on their website product and I, along with another Sage Corps Fellow, was tasked to build a data-visualization platform to better express the company's aggregated data on mines around the world. I had very little programming experience prior to this internship but I can now comfortably program in Javascript, Python, CSS, and HTML thanks to the support of The CloudMiner team, my co-worker James Xue (studying Computer Science at Columbia), and dedicated hours outside of work. By the end of the program, we had built a powerful data-visualization tool that The CloudMiner still uses.

Day-to-Day:
The Sage Corps program fully immersed us in the entrepreneurial scene in Hong Kong; we visited co-working spaces (The Good Lab, Cocoon HK), enjoyed speaker events (Simon Squibb and Guy Parsonage of fluid), and visited local businesses to learn about Hong Kong's business situation (JLL Hong Kong). The CloudMiner personally took James and I to a product presentation of a similar product (Tableau) for business insights and networking. We stayed at the Harbor Plaza Hotel, great accommodations for such a cramped city with immediate access to the Hong Kong MTR system and buses.

The daily schedule was as follows:
- Wake up at 8, get to work by 10
- Work on fixing bugs or improving visualization platform features or begin working on new functionality
- Have lunch around 12:30 with the entire team at a local restaurant
- Return to work with various snacks that James picked out from the malls nearby
- Finish work around 18:00, take recommendations from The CloudMiner team for dinner
- Work out at the Harbor Plaza basement gym with 4 other Sage Corps Fellows and sauna after

Highlights:
- Each of the Sage Corps fellows were incredibly driven, focused, and willing to explore - some of the best people I have ever met. Everyone was interested in learning more about start-ups and becoming entrepreneurs, making the most out of their summer. We passed around a copy of the Lean Startup to read on our commutes, went to the gym together, and we visited Macau twice throughout our trip.
- I learned a completely foreign skill. Like I said earlier, I had little prior programming experience but I can now program in Javascript, Python, CSS, HTML and currently learning R and Apache Spark for data analysis.
- Experienced first-hand the business practices and ideas of a foreign country. We were educated on Hong Kong's real estate situation by JLL Hong Kong; James Guzy (another co-founder of The CloudMiner) talked at length about the difference between Hong Kong and mainland China's business attitudes. The co-working spaces we visited, especially Cocoon HK, were incredibly gracious and shared with us their resources such as pitch nights and free-lance opportunities.
- Sage Corps programming: a boat tour of Hong Kong with our country managers
- Bungee jumping off the world's tallest bungee jump in Macau

Difficulties:
- A few language barriers, I'm not fluent in Chinese. Luckily most of Hong Kong is Englicized and another Fellow was a native speaker from Beijing. We never were stuck anywhere and could always find someone to communicate with.

What would you improve about this program?
If this program could somehow be integrated with universities it would help with getting scholarships or grants to reduce the cost.
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James
5/5
Yes, I recommend this program

Learn To Move Fast And Break Things

Through Sage Corps, I secured an internship with the CloudMiner Ltd, a tech startup in Hong Kong. I worked on a data visualization project in Javascript that helped me jumpstart my career in CS.

Sage Corps is a great program for students looking to doing real work at an innovative company, develop important networking skills, and expand their worldview by going abroad. Working abroad is incredibly valuable, and working for a startup is a great way to meet exciting people and learn practical skills - for me, it was hands-on web development.

On top of the work experience, Hong Kong has a vibrant, energetic, and youthful vibe with a budding startup community. It's a great place for college students to develop skills that they would not get in the classroom or even in America. Socially, there's something going on that you'll never be bored. Culturally, it's fascinating to interact with the locals, learn some Cantonese, and of course, eat the delicious cuisine!

I loved the summer I spent at CloudMiner, and I'm very glad that I did the program. I'm excited to see Sage Corps expand to new locations!

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Jacob
5/5
Yes, I recommend this program

An Invaluable Experience

As a student studying Business and Spanish, the Sage Corps Argentina program allowed me to practice my spanish speaking ability daily. Additionally, I was able to experience first hand the culture of working for a startup. As in any startup environment, the day-to-day work can variable, but this taught me the importance of being a self starter in the workplace. I was able to initiate and complete a comprehensive market research project on Peru during my time with OMLatam Academy, in addition to my other responsibilities. Also, having 10 other students in country working in similar situations offered a great support system and provided a network to be able to enjoy the great Argentinian nightlife. This experience is something I will be able to speak about and will remember for the rest of my life.

What would you improve about this program?
The program could benefit from a more cultural orientation. The week long orientation we underwent was beneficial from the standpoint of understanding the Latin American tech scene and understanding the workplace; however, the orientation failed to educate us on some essential components of Argentinian culture. That being said, these were things I had the opportunity to learn about during my time in country.
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Michael
5/5
Yes, I recommend this program

Catalyst in Jump Starting Your Career

Working with a startup in Buenos Aires taught me so much about the intersection of Latin American culture and business. Being thrown into an environment that both tested my ability to excel in a foreign business atmosphere and provide great work for my start-up was something I couldn't have gotten anywhere else. Sage Corps is 100% my catalyst on getting the full-time job offer I was seeking. The skills and values one obtains from pushing outside of one's comfort zone with Sage Corps are invaluable for any path you wish to pursue.

What would you improve about this program?
The matching process for companies was sometimes great and other times fairly arbitrary. However, after working with Sage Corps as an alumnus of the program, the new method for matching students with start up companies has been greatly improved to offer participants the best possible experience.