Data Scientist Review

I had a really good time throughout the summer - the company-organised events really helped me settle in and get to know everyone. Living with the other interns was also really beneficial as were able to travel to work together and get together in the evenings. I definitely enjoyed my summer more because of this internship.

Everyone was very welcoming and friendly from the start. Throughout the internship I had conversations with some of the people in my team about the project I was doing and what else I could be working on, and it was nice to see that other people were interested in my work.

There was always support available if I needed it from my supervisor and other members of my team.

I always had work to be doing on my project, but I would have liked to have had more to work on in other projects or other things to be doing so it wasn't just the same sort of work for a couple of weeks at a time. However I'm not sure how feasible that is for an internship anyway as it takes time to get to know different areas of the company.

The R training I received in the first week along with working in R throughout the internship was very valuable as it's a language that's widely used across data related jobs and I have no doubt that the skills I've learnt will both help me to get jobs in future, and set me up to do well in future jobs

Sparx has a great atmosphere - everyone is approachable and friendly, and the company is set up in a way that allows everyone to interact and get to know each other. There's also a pool table, table tennis and table football which was a huge plus for me. I also think everyone believes that the work is for a good cause, and cares a lot about improving education.

I found that the company put a lot of effort into training for the interns. We were provided with two days of training prior to the internship, and a lot of our first week was training related as well. Then throughout the internship we'd occasionally have sessions with our project lead about learning new things related to the job.

The company is currently growing quite fast and puts a lot of resources into graduate recruitment, so there are definitely opportunities available. There's also a decent amount of flexibility within the company, and many of the people I've talked to started in one team, but found their niche and have since moved to another team.

As well as the company events throughout the internship, there was a great social scene within the group of interns. We got together almost every night to either go out for a meal, play games, or just watch a film as a group. The social aspect was the best part of the summer for me as I got along with the other interns and some colleagues really well.

Exeter isn't the cheapest place to live, however our accommodation was provided and there was free breakfast and lunch in the office canteen every day, so our living costs were actually very low. There were still some places would could go out and eat or socialise in the evening as at a reasonable price too.

As well as there being a lot of company events and socials, there's sport on pretty much every day. There's a gym and an astroturf pitch at the office so a lot of sports and classes go on before and after work. Then outside of that, we (interns) were always busy outside of work, with things like pub quizzes, cinema trips, etc.