Sachiko Leahy, M.S. ‘00

Senior Quality Assurance Analyst
Kronos

How did Riv prepare you for your career? Everything I learned at River prepared me for my career—from C and Java programming, learning about the software development cycle, SQL scripts, database table creation, data modeling, team collaboration, and presentation skills.

What is a typical day for you?  As a QA Lead, the day usually starts at 8 a.m. with a standup meeting involving the team in India; we discuss issues and blocks with the team and the technical leader. The rest of the day is usually spent working with project managers or the architect to unblock issues or to discuss another feature for the software. I also make test plans and work on estimates for the next project with the tech leads. I love to analyze the data failures and deliver a high quality product for Kronos.

Your advice to future students? Not only you will get a degree that you can utilize immediately upon graduation, but also you will also meet great professors and classmates. Since classes are usually small —20 to 30 students— you get to know people and build great friendships and [your professional] network.