Meet Jun!

Hi, I’m Jun Liu, an Information Management graduate student and one of the iSchool Graduate Ambassadors. I am in my final semester and will graduate in May 2023. It’s hard to believe that I’m already almost two years into my time in Urbana-Champaign. This semester, I’m only taking one course in the computer science department, distributed systems, which is a three-credit hour course and not too heavy of a workload. However, I have yet to secure my ideal job offer, so I need to put in more effort into my job search. 

I decided to take distributed systems on a recommendation from a classmate. Although the professor’s lectures are engaging and the course has replays available, the programming assignments require a high level of proficiency in programming languages. To lighten my course load, I opted for the threecredit hours option instead of four, which meant I had four fewer programming assignments to complete. I currently spend around six hours per week on this class. 

What I’m Up To

My focus is now on job hunting. I received a job offer from a consulting firm in China last month, but I turned it down because the salary wasn’t competitive. I am still applying and interviewing for positions, having applied to over 30 positions and completed three interviews so far. This number is low as some of my classmates said that they have submitted their resumes more than 100 times. I hope I can make 50+ valid resume submissions in the next month. 

In addition to job searching, I’m collaborating with a friend on an in-depth article about ChatGPT, the fastest-growing chatbot program from OpenAI. ChatGPT has amassed over 100 million users in two months, and we want to analyze its development and application trends from the perspective of AI-generated content (AIGC). I am interested in this topic, and my friend and I are discussing the article outline and collecting data. We aim to complete the article within a month and publish it. 

My Goals

Finally, my career goal is to work as a technical consultant or industry analyst in an IT company. My interests in science fiction and aerial photography align with cutting-edge technology, such as augmented reality and cyberpunk. I’m also a CFA Level 3 candidate and have a year of experience as an IT consultant for an AI company. The MSIM program’s comprehensive curriculum and flexible structure have provided me with the necessary tools to explore next-generation technologies, and I am happy that my interests align with what I’m learning. 

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