Finding a Family Virtually
ADYA AGGARWAL, SIP ‘20
ADYA IS A RISING SENIOR AT THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA. SHE IS PURSUING A DUAL DEGREE AS PART OF THE MANAGEMENT AND TECHNOLOGY PROGRAM AND IS MAJORING IN SYSTEMS ENGINEERING AND FINANCE, WITH A MINOR IN MATHEMATICS.
My freshman summer, I found out about Girls Who Invest’s Summer Intensive Program. I was working with the Wharton Social Impact initiative, just a few buildings away from Steinberg Hall on Penn’s campus, where Girls Who Invest (GWI) sessions were taking place. One day, I saw young women in GWI custom vests taking a group photo outside Steinberg. I stood outside and envisioned myself in the picture.
Fast forward five months
I received my acceptance to the program. I was elated to spend my summer with brilliant women from all over the nation, brought together by a passion for learning about the asset management industry.
In March, schools across the U.S. began shutting down due to COVID-19 and it soon dawned on me that internships could shift to a fully virtual medium too. A few weeks later, I received an email from GWI explaining that our program had been moved online. All my visions of standing outside of Steinberg in my GWI vest blurred and faded into oblivion.
Going virtual was absolutely the right thing to do. However, my mind began racing with thoughts like “How will we build a sense of community online?”, “Will there be Zoom fatigue?”, “Oh, I would’ve loved to meet the amazing speakers that GWI has lined up every year in person.”
Our program kicked off with a full month of jam-packed days with lectures by distinguished faculty members from Wharton, Notre Dame, and UCLA, guest lectures and panels by renowned investors like Seth Klarman and trailblazing women in asset management, intensive training by Wall Street Prep and Bloomberg, and topped with lessons on developing soft skills like business etiquette.
At the end of the program, we presented our investment recommendation for Etsy - a company we were engaging with throughout the program. We even got a chance to speak with top management from Etsy to aid our analysis. We ended up pitching a BUY for Etsy back in late June 2020, and months later as we saw our thesis play out, we regretted not having invested in Etsy’s stock ourselves.
Phew! I know it sounds like a lot, but that summer was one of the single greatest learning experiences of my life. Remember how I mentioned I was worried about feeling a sense of community before the program began? While we may not have been able to have a shared experience in the sense of sitting together in the same room during our lessons and activities, we made the best of a Zoom setting.
My Etsy team bonded very well and so did so many other teams I know.
We formed lifelong bonds. Having online events like Trivia Night, Treasure Hunt, and Baking Club led to the discovery of other shared activities. Staying connected through group chats, talking out our struggles with the material and working through them together, helping each other with mock interviews, and joining spontaneous calls with the promise of organizing in-person meetups in the future allowed us to form a sense of community even over Zoom.
I am looking forward to the next GWI cohort starting their Summer Intensive Program. Here’s to learning, continuing to be a part of an amazing community of the most supportive women I know, and breaking glass ceilings together.
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