How UMBC Helped Turn Curiosity Into Opportunity
Seeking hands-on experience in software engineering, research, and emerging technologies, Shourya Rami, M.P.S. ’26, software engineering found a community at UMBC that encouraged him to grow both professionally and personally. From working alongside faculty researchers to mentoring students and building AI-enabled applications, his experience illustrates how the M.P.S. in Software Engineering program prepares students for careers in a rapidly evolving technology landscape.
Information Systems: Tell us about yourself and your journey at UMBC.
Shourya Rami: Coming from India after completing my Bachelor’s in Computer Engineering, joining UMBC felt like stepping into a completely different world and honestly, that was exactly what I needed. My entire life I lived and studied in my hometown, so coming to a new country alone, managing everything by myself, and figuring out how to wake up early without anyone telling me to (yes, that was a real challenge) was a whole journey in itself. But looking back, I am genuinely proud of how I figured things out and kept going.
I chose UMBC because of its welcoming and supportive community and the rare opportunity to learn directly alongside faculty who bring decades of research and industry experience. As someone stepping into graduate school straight after a bachelor’s degree, I knew I needed more than just courses, I needed mentorship, exposure, and real opportunities. UMBC gave me all of that.
During my time here I had the opportunity to work as a Research Assistant under Dr. Carolyn Seaman, as a Teaching Assistant for the Software Engineering Capstone under Dr. Mohammad Samarah, and as a Graduate Assistant in other courses, experiences that exposed me to both academic research and software engineering education in ways I never expected going in.
What I did not fully anticipate was how much the experience would change me, not just as a software engineer but as a person. I came here as someone who was quite introverted, barely talked to new people, and honestly felt awkward in most social situations. By the end of it, I was leading teams, collaborating with researchers from different countries, guiding students through their projects, and genuinely enjoying the process of meeting people with completely different mindsets and backgrounds. That personal growth, alongside everything I learned academically, is what makes my UMBC journey something I will always look on with a lot of pride and gratitude.
IS: How has UMBC and the IS Department helped prepare you for your future career?
SR: UMBC gave me an environment where learning never really stops. The community here; professors, peers, and staff genuinely encourage you to keep growing, try new things, and reach out without hesitation. Coming as an international student, someone who had never stepped outside his country, that open and supportive environment made a huge difference in how I settled in and how much I was able to push myself.
The IS department specifically prepared me in ways I did not expect. I came in thinking software development was mostly about writing good, efficient code. What the courses, especially under Dr. Mohammad Samarah, taught me is that the real work starts way before any code is written. Planning, designing architecture, understanding requirements, thinking about who is going to use this software and how, that is where a project begins. A solid plan makes everything that follows so much smoother, and that mindset shift alone has changed how I approach every project.
One course that genuinely surprised me was HCC 629 – Fundamentals of Human-Centered Computing under Dr. Yasmine Kotturi. I expected a standard software course and instead walked out thinking differently about design in everyday life, not just in software but in physical objects too. How the handle of a door, the layout of a webpage, or even the placement of a button can completely change someone’s experience. It sounds small but it is not. That course taught me that even the tiniest design decision has an impact on real people, and I carry that thinking into everything I build now.
Beyond the classroom, the opportunities UMBC gave me, as a Teaching Assistant, Research Assistant, and Graduate Assistant meant I was applying what I learned in real settings, not just absorbing theory. That combination is what truly prepared me for the industry.
IS: What experiences, projects, or opportunities have been most meaningful during your time at UMBC?
SR: There are a few that genuinely stand out, each for very different reasons.
Working as a Teaching Assistant for the Software Engineering Capstone course under Dr. Mohammad Samarah was something I truly enjoyed. Each semester I got to see different students come in with their own project ideas, pitch them to real sponsors, face real challenges, and find their own solutions. No two projects were the same. Helping them work through difficulties and guiding them at key moments was something I did not expect to value as much as I did. Watching them go from rough ideas to completed systems being presented to real sponsors was incredibly rewarding and honestly, I learned just as much from them as they did from me.
Being a Graduate Assistant for IS 636 – Structured Systems Analysis and Design under Dr. Carolyn Seaman added a different kind of perspective. Grading assignments across a whole class showed me something important: there is never one perfect solution to a problem. Every student approached the same challenge differently, and each approach had its own strengths. That completely changed how I think about problem solving, less about finding the “right” answer and more about understanding why different approaches work in different contexts.
And then there was HCC 629 – Fundamentals of Human-Centered Computing under Dr. Yasmine Kotturi. I went in expecting a fairly standard software course and came out looking at the world differently. As a student in that course, working on projects like redesigning the Giant Food website using Norman’s design principles made me think about software in a completely new way, through the lens of human behavior, mental models, and real usability rather than just functionality. That course, more than any other, changed how I look at everyday design.
IS: Have you participated in experiences outside the classroom connected to your field?
SR: Yes, before coming to UMBC I worked at TechNishal in India, where I was both a ReactJS Intern and an Instructor teaching web development to beginner and intermediate learners. My teaching covered C, HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript, ReactJS, Node.js with Express, MongoDB, and MySQL. What made it a unique experience was that both roles overlapped. I was literally building real projects and teaching these concepts to students at the same time. Teaching something while actively using it gives you a completely different level of understanding, and I think that experience shaped how I approach learning and explaining technical concepts even now.
During my bachelor’s I was also a member of the Google Developer Student Club and attended workshops in Android development with Kotlin, JavaScript, ReactJS, and general web development, which is what first got me seriously interested in the web development space.
And one experience I am particularly proud of from my bachelor’s days, I co-led the developer team for our college’s Technical Fest. We built the official fest website from scratch with real-time event registration, me along with a five-member team made it happen. That was my first real taste of leading a development team under actual pressure, with a real deadline and real people depending on the outcome. Looking back, it was probably the experience that first showed me I could lead and deliver, not just participate.
IS: Describe a project, internship, research experience, or role you are most proud of.
SR: Honestly it is hard to pick just one, so I will mention two, each meaningful in a very different way.
The first is my work as a Research Assistant under Dr. Carolyn Seaman on a Systematic Literature Review investigating how Technical Debt concepts are taught and assessed in software engineering education. Before coming to UMBC, research was genuinely not something I had ever thought about for myself. It felt like something other people did. But getting involved in this project completely changed that. Reading research papers, not for a quick answer but to really understand the small details, the methodology, and the gaps taught me a kind of deep thinking that is hard to get anywhere else. In a world where you can ask AI almost anything and get an instant answer, sitting with a paper and truly understanding what the authors were doing and why felt surprisingly rewarding.
What made it even more meaningful was the personal growth that came with it. I am naturally shy, someone who finds it uncomfortable to talk to new people. But this research put me in contact with people from different universities and different countries, and I had to show up, contribute, and communicate. That shift from someone who avoided new interactions to someone actively collaborating across borders is something I am genuinely proud of.
The second is my Capstone project “UMBC Learn,” a learning resource recommendation engine built specifically for software engineering students at UMBC. The idea came from a real problem I observed: students often do not know where to find relevant resources when starting a course project, and when they turn to generic AI tools they get answers from the general internet rather than from what their professor taught. The project was designed to reduce exactly that gap by making instructor-provided material the primary source of recommendations, so students get answers grounded in what their course actually covers rather than whatever the internet thinks is relevant.
Building this over one semester from pitching the idea, to designing a system with five user roles, to integrating Google Gemini for AI features, to finally deploying it, was one of the most complete experiences I have had. It was also a chance to bring together everything I had learned across my entire master’s journey, from software architecture and design patterns to human-centered thinking and AI integration. It was not always smooth there were moments where things broke and I had no idea why, and I had to reach out to professors and peers for guidance. But going through that full cycle idea, design, build, struggle, fix, deliver, taught me more than any single course could.
IS: What tools, technologies, or skills have you used throughout your academic or professional experiences?
SR: On the technical side, I have worked extensively with the MERN stack (MongoDB, Express.js, React.js, and Node.js) along with JavaScript, Java, Python, HTML, and CSS. For my Capstone project I integrated Google Gemini for AI-powered features and deployed the full application using Vercel and Render. I have used Git and GitHub for version control across all my projects, and tools like Google Colab and Figma for prototyping and design work during my HCC and research projects.
During my research work under Dr. Seaman I got hands-on experience with REST API integrations with academic databases, data processing using Python, and working with LLM APIs, which was a whole new world of tooling that I did not expect to touch during a master’s program but ended up being one of the most interesting parts of my time here.
Beyond the technical tools, some of the most valuable skills I learned here are the ones that sdo not show up easily on a resume, like how to lead a team of people who all think differently and have different working styles, how to communicate clearly with a professor, a sponsor, or a research collaborator, how to read academic literature and extract what actually matters, and how to design with the end user in mind rather than just what is technically convenient. Those skills, honestly, are what I think will matter most in the long run.
IS: What advice would you give to current or future students?
SR: Never be afraid to try things, even the things that feel too big or too uncomfortable. Take every opportunity that comes your way, even the small ones, because you genuinely never know how much it will matter down the line. Talk to your professors. Reach out to people. Join things even when you feel like you do not belong yet. I came to UMBC as someone quite shy who felt awkward talking to new people, and some of the best experiences I had here came directly from pushing past that discomfort.
Do not constrain yourself to one thing either. Stay open, be willing to adapt, and give yourself time to figure things out. New countries, new environments, new ways of learning they all take time to get used to, and that is completely okay. The first semester might feel overwhelming, but it gets better, and then it gets genuinely exciting.
Start believing in yourself earlier than I did. I spent a lot of time wondering if I was good enough to take on certain opportunities the TA role, the research position, leading teams. Every single time I pushed past that doubt it turned out to be worth it. So, take the chance, start earlier, and do not forget to enjoy the experience along the way. It goes faster than you think.
IS: Which skill or area are you most excited to continue developing after graduation?
SR: Honestly its “AI, but probably not in the way most people mean when they say that. I am not particularly focused on building models from scratch or becoming an ML engineer. What genuinely excites me is learning how to use AI thoughtfully and effectively as a tool as a colleague, really. Because that is what it is becoming.
In today’s world, AI can do a lot. But it also makes mistakes, sometimes confidently wrong ones, and blindly relying on it without your own judgment leads to bigger problems than it solves. What I find genuinely interesting and what I think will matter a lot soon, is building systems and workflows that combine AI capabilities with human thinking in smart ways. Not using AI everywhere just because you can but understanding where it helps and where a human mind is still irreplaceable.
I started thinking about this more seriously during my Capstone project, where I integrated AI into a real application with real users and had to think carefully about when the AI should answer and when it should defer to instructor-provided content. That practical experience of designing around AI rather than just plugging it in made me realize this is an area I want to keep going deeper into.
IS: What are your career goals or roles you are you interested in pursuing?
SR: Currently, I am actively looking for software engineering roles, Software Engineer, Full-Stack Developer, or anything in that space where I can get real industry experience, work with talented people, and keep facing new challenges. Coming out of a master’s program, I know there is still a lot I have not seen yet, and I genuinely want to be in an environment where I am learning something new every single day.
I also want to keep growing my understanding of AI, not as a trend to follow, but as a practical skill. Knowing how to design systems that use AI intelligently, understanding its limitations, and being someone who can bridge the gap between what AI can do and what a product needs, that is a skill set I think will matter a lot in the next few years.
Longer term, I thought a lot about whether to pursue a PhD right after my master’s, but after talking to professors and other students, I realized that going into industry first and then coming back to research with actual experience and perspective is the smarter path for me. So, the goal is to spend a few years in the industry, build something real, and then pursue a PhD with a much richer point of view than I would have had going straight from coursework. Ultimately, I want to build software that solves meaningful problems while continuing to contribute to education, mentorship, and research throughout my career because those have been recurring themes throughout my time at UMBC, and they are not things I want to leave behind.
To learn more about Shourya and his work, connect with him on LinkedIn and follow him on Instagram.
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