Finding Your Tribe

As I move more into the tech world, I've found (and been pointed towards) a host of IT-related events.

For anyone else who's looking to get more into IT, here are some ways you can become part of the community:

1. Use Apps to Get Started

When it comes to connecting to my tech interests, my favorite apps's Eventbrite.

Why?

Its algorithms are smart and it makes things so easy.

Not long after starting to use Eventbrite, it learned what events I was interested in, then started suggesting ones to me. It made finding new events effortless and connected me to groups and ideas I'm not sure I would've found on my own.

2. Go to Events

Once something's caught your interest, go to it!

Here are some up-coming events in the Twin Cities that I'm excited about:

• Tuesday, March 19th - Intro to Data Science: Predict the Box Office

• Thursday, March 28th - Artificial Intelligence Day

• Thursday, April 4th - Young Women in STEM Summit

• Tuesday, April 16th - Trailblazers: Young Women Succeeding in Science and Technology

And as a bonus, here's a virtual event that anyone can be a part of:

• Tuesday, April 30th - Machine Learning & AI Foundations: A Guide to Predictive Modeling

3. Stay Connected with Event Hosts

There's a solid chance that the people hosting an event are going to hold events again or have ways that you could get involved with them, so stay open-minded and see what you're drawn to.

Case in point: last week I went to an event hosted by StarEightyTwo, which is a local non-profit that gives coaching on data analytics and does real-world, data-driven projects.

Their event show-cased three different projects that all used AI - and that were built by StarEightyTwo members.

That was inspiring.

And it got me to sign up for their mailing list. Now I'm impatiently waiting for their next meet-up so I can be a part of the upcoming projects.

So My Fellow Explorers

Let's get out there, see what we find and have fun!