Google Tech Equity Collective Rising Innovators: Initial Thoughts

If you have been following me, you would know that I have been accepted into the Google Tech Equity Collective’s Rising Innovators Program. I have learned about it through the Brilliant Black Minds newsletter.

I attended the kickoff and then my first breakout session yesterday. Here were my initial thoughts:

• It was the pilot (first) program
• There were 1300 people. That’s a lot
• The staff were supportive
• There was an on demand track option
• In my breakout, I felt that I had way more tech experience than they did

The Pilot Program

This was the first time that Google ran this program. I admitted that I was honor to have made the cut of being one of the first. As a Black person, being the first meant that I had the tech skillset to be what Google was looking for.

There Were 1300 People.

That’s a lot of people for the initial cohort. The GCP Jumpstart Associate Cloud Engineer Program did not have 130 people. Imagine 10 times the number of people. I think that Google expects massive dropoff in between March and July. However, for me it will be interesting to see how this goes wrangling 1300 people.