2021 Pie & AI Ambassador Spotlight: Utkarsh Raj & Tharindu Adhikan
Utkarsh Raj
Koch, India
Utkarsh is an aspiring Computer Science enthusiast involved with various communities such as Developers Students Club, Pehia Foundation, TinkerHub Foundation, Pie&AI: Kochi and Agora, and more. He is interested in mentoring other students, organizing and participating in tech events. Utkarsh recently started a service-based startup providing technical solutions to clients.
Why did you become a DeepLearning.AI Event Ambassador?
UR: When I started my journey in machine learning, I attended many events and joined communities of people interested in the field. Dr. Andrew Ng’s ML course on Coursera helped me look at things differently and expanded my perspective. I was fortunate to come across the ambassador opportunity and was glad to start organizing events apart from participating finally. I’m grateful for all I have been able to learn.
Tell us about your experience as an Event Ambassador for the DeepLearning.AI community.
UR: I hosted my first session in August last year with guest speaker Kurian Benoy. Since then, it’s been a great learning experience that has helped me grow my professional career. Organizing Pie & AI meetups has helped me meet like-minded people who share my passion for AI. I have collaborated with ambassadors, interacted with fantastic speakers, and conversed with a great audience during this experience.
What have you learned and gained from this experience?
UR: Being part of the community as an ambassador, organizing events, interacting with participants, connecting with speakers who are well-versed in the field has been a great learning experience and contributed to my personal growth. Conducting sessions on different ML topics, helping other enthusiasts, resolving their queries, and more has become my way of giving back to the community.
You can find Utkarsh Raj on Linkedin.
Tharindu Adhikan
Colombo, Sri Lanka
Tharindu Adhikari graduated in Electrical and Information Engineering from the University of Ruhuna, Sri Lanka, and obtained a Masters of Science in AI from Moratuwa, Sri Lanka. Currently, she is the Secretary of the AI Popularization Committee of the Sri Lanka Association for Artificial Intelligence (SLAAI).
Why did you become a DeepLearning.AI Event Ambassador?
TA: In 2011, I registered for the Machine Learning course by Dr. Andrew Ng, and it was a turning point in my life; I became an ardent fan of and started following his work. I have been popularizing AI in Sri Lanka in different capacities for over a decade now. The Pie & AI meetups by DeepLearning.AI have been a great platform to create valuable connections and learn from others.
Tell us about your experience as an Event Ambassador for the DeepLearning.AI community
TA: I´ve immensely enjoyed acting as an event ambassador for the DeepLearning.AI community because of all the incredible speakers we could get and the topics we discussed during the events. These meetups provide a great space to learn about new developments within the industry and to meet like-minded people who share my passion for AI and ML.
What have you learned and gained from this experience?
TA: It was a fantastic experience to work with the Sri Lankan AI community. I derived great satisfaction from the impact that I have made on the country’s people. By being an ambassador, I have met many like-minded people in Sri Lanka and around the world.
You can find Tharindu Adhikari on Linkedin.
