[iliekcomputers]

I was a student in a no-name college with no real chance of landing an internship at the big tech companies, given my cv had neither the prestige of a good college name nor many impressive projects.

GSoC basically allowed me to jump into an open-source project (no credentials needed), prove that I'm skilled enough to contribute and gain meaningful experience solving real world problems. This then snowballed into larger career opportunities later down the line.