How Haven Life celebrates National Intern Day

July 29th is National Intern Day. So, we thought what better time to introduce you to our interns, tell you what they’ve been up to this summer, and share why they are raving about their experience — and why, as one intern put it, at Haven Life, “you’re not just an intern; you’re a part of the team.” Without further ado, let’s meet the team.

Benjamin Teo

Team: Underwriting
School: NYU
Major: Computer Science

Summer project at Haven Life: “Underwriters assess the risk of an application and evaluate if/how we would be able to approve an applicant. We create the dashboards that support the risk assessment. One of my main projects this summer was to assist my mentor in the design, creation and implementation of an internal library for a new version of Haven Term. We’ve redesigned a portion of our system to use a generalized data model that is aligned with insurance industry standards to be more scalable.”

Favorite part of the internship: “It has been a great summer at Haven Life so far. You’re not just an intern; you’re a part of the team, and you’re directly contributing to the organization’s success. I also love interacting with the diverse team members and learning from each and every one of them.”

On mentorship at Haven Life: “When I was looking for internships, an opportunity that provided mentorship during my summer was vital to my search. I truly value being able to have someone to look up to and get constant feedback on my performance. No questions are too silly and I’m able to go to my mentor for any help that I need without judgement. I truly appreciate having guidance and having a mentor at Haven Life has definitely added to my internship experience.”

Linor Kuighadoush

Team: Haven DTC
School: Touro College
Major: Computer Science

Summer project at Haven Life: “My team worked on the Haven Secure and Salary Protection products. I was responsible for writing pact tests between Haven Secure and the Salary Protection API which basically tests that the correct information is being sent over to the API endpoints, and in return, it tests that the API sends back appropriate information to Haven Secure.”

Favorite part of the internship: “Getting to meet lots of new people and chatting with them. Everyone is super friendly and is open to helping you with whatever you need!”

On mentorship at Haven Life: “At Haven Life, each intern is paired up with a mentor who’s a developer on the team that you’re placed on. My mentor assigns the work I’ll be doing and oversees my day-to-day tasks during our daily meetings. They are someone that I know I can turn to with my questions and ask for advice as to how to approach different tasks. Most importantly, my mentor guides and challenges me to help me build new skills and grow as a developer. “

Arifa Baksh

Team: Advisor Sales Tools
School: Hunter College
Major: Computer Science

Summer project at Haven Life: “My team belongs to the overall Coverpath team, so most of my day-to-day entails working on features for the Coverpath platform, specifically features that will improve the user experience for advisors. I have worked on a UI update for the cost breakdown of the premium total on the Coverpath quote page. I’m also working on a feature for the Concept Illustrations tab that will allow advisors and proxies to better manage Illustrations they generate by giving them a delete option.”

Favorite part of the internship: “My favorite part about working at Haven Life is the welcoming community. Everyone, even those beyond my team, is willing to help me grow as a developer. I feel comfortable reaching out to ask for help when I encounter a blocker or when I want to learn more about a topic.”

On mentorship at Haven Life: “I enjoy working with my mentor everyday! She is understanding and patient, and I have learned so much from her. She invites me to meetings to keep me updated on product releases and other projects my team is working on. She is the main reason why I believe my coding skills are improving and why I am passionate about the work I’m doing. My mentor, as well as my hiring buddy and my teammates, have given me valuable advice on how to leverage my skills and accept challenges to succeed in my career.”

Eric Zhou

Team: DOI
School: Northeastern University
Major: Computer Science

Summer project at Haven Life: “Customer data portal — when someone applies for a policy, we pull a bunch of data on them. We want to give them the option to see exactly what data we have to increase transparency with customers. So far, the backend is finished; the data we need is exposed and is ready to be pulled from a front end client.”

Favorite part of the internship: “It’s encouraged for you to get out of your comfort zone, tackle big projects, and learn new skills- everyone is very supportive and always willing to help. “

On mentorship at Haven Life: “I’ve picked up a lot of leadership and communication skills that help encourage collaboration and teamwork. They have also been immensely helpful in teaching me any technical concepts I was having trouble with, walking me through any problems I was having.”

Arkin Satija

Team: Policy Administration
School: Boston University
Major: Computer Science

Summer project at Haven Life: “My team is responsible for managing the workflows of each policy (billing, payment information, policy information, etc.) I’ve worked on stories all over PA’s responsibilities so far including the PA GUI, ORCA workflows, and PDF Stream. A specific feature I’ve implemented was the option of adding a payer as a business in the GUI and having it reflect in the backend/database.”

Favorite part of the internship: “My favorite part about working at Haven Life is the culture. Specifically the fact that everyone all over the organization is so willing to help you and are super inclusive. Coming into the office really emphasized all that in the best way possible.”

On mentorship at Haven Life: “Mentorship at Haven Life has come in the form of multiple people instead of JUST my assigned mentor. I’ve personally reached out to multiple other employees at Haven Life to ask for guidance and feedback on topics relevant to their role, and they responded in the most helpful and inviting way. But of course a HUGE shoutout to my assigned mentor, Amir, who not only has shown me the reigns of Policy Admin but also the reigns to starting my career and helping me learn more about myself and how I can quickly breakdown any problem I’ve run into and come up with an action plan to solve the problem. That was something I struggled with before starting my internship here.”

Leroy Hutchinson

Team: Policy Administration
School: New York City College of Technology
Major: Computer System Technology

Summer project at Haven Life: “This summer I worked on Metron which is Haven Life’s tool for controlling its metadata. Metron will allow metadata to be controlled not just by developers on the Haven Life team but also the Product Owners and Actuaries without developers getting involved. I have mostly been working on features/bugs for the product specification page on Metron. I was able to push multiple changes to the main development branch and I learned a ton of new stuff about the Angular Framework”

Favorite part of the internship: “The community, hands down, is the best professional community I have ever experienced. There are really smart and friendly people everywhere you look.”

On mentorship at Haven Life: “I never felt like I was stuck on a coding problem that I had to figure out alone. The team (especially Tom, Jee, Zack and Ademola) were always available, or made themselves available, to help.”