The Student Room Group

Google STEP 2017 - Summer Trainee Engineering Programme

I'll be applying to the above programme this academic year and was wondering if anyone else is going for it.

Feel free to comment if you are, hopefully we can share tips/info about the whole process. I'll also tag a user (bigboateng_) who did the programme this year too for questions etc. *

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Reply 1
I thought you wanted to go into banking...
Original post by Trapz99
I thought you wanted to go into banking...


yh but when else am I gonna try out a tech internship? not like I'm doing anything in first year summer ahahaha

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Reply 3
Original post by Princepieman
yh but when else am I gonna try out a tech internship? not like I'm doing anything in first year summer ahahaha

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Ah I see
This looks pretty interesting, I might apply as well.
Original post by NamelessPersona
This looks pretty interesting, I might apply as well.


Waheey! Best of luck :smile:

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I want to apply!

EDIT: Just read the requirements and it said I must be pursuing CompSci or a related field at university. Would Electrical and Electronic Engineering with Computer Science at UCL count?

EDIT again: The location includes Munich - that's perfect!
(edited 7 years ago)
Original post by tanyapotter
I want to apply!

EDIT: Just read the requirements and it said I must be pursuing CompSci or a related field at university. Would Electrical and Electronic Engineering with Computer Science at UCL count?

EDIT again: The location includes Munich - that's perfect!


Means any STEM degree really

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Reply 8
Subbed. What are you guys doing to perk up your application?

This is the link right? https://www.google.com/about/careers/search#!t=jo&jid=146715001&
Original post by tanyapotter
I want to apply!

EDIT: Just read the requirements and it said I must be pursuing CompSci or a related field at university. Would Electrical and Electronic Engineering with Computer Science at UCL count?

EDIT again: The location includes Munich - that's perfect!


I study aerospace engineering and still got in, so the degree doesn't really matter, as long as you have the knowledge, experience and an algorithmic thinker.
whens the deadline ?
Original post by TrojanH
Subbed. What are you guys doing to perk up your application?

This is the link right? https://www.google.com/about/careers/search#!t=jo&jid=146715001&


Probs just looking up some algorithms stuff, building a few web related things etc

And that's one version of last year's, there's a few entries: one for london/Dublin and one for zurich/munich/warsaw etc

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Original post by bigboateng_
I study aerospace engineering and still got in, so the degree doesn't really matter, as long as you have the knowledge, experience and an algorithmic thinker.


Did the interviewers expect you to have in depth algorithm and data structures knowledge before? Or did they walk you through stuff?

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Ok so I guess I should put a general info here as someone who got a STEP internship.

STEP (Summer Technical Engineering Programme) is opened to EMEA (Europe, Middle-East, Africa) university students, basically every country that isnt the US for first and second year students. This is a chance for you to come an intern at google, get paid and gain some experience. The way the process works is you apply online, with just your CV, there isn't really any questions u have to answer, you literally just send your CV and your name, email. So your CV has to speak for you. Some people (non-software engineers) will take a look at your CV (if you apply early) so if your CV doesn't immediately scream genius, then well played atleast you tried. But the lucky ones who pass that stage will get an interview. You interview with 2 different engineers (on the same day) through google hangouts (live video) where they ask you to solve problems. But yeah the interview assumes you are decent at a particular language, it has to be one of java/c++/python. And you knowing your data structures (LinkedList, BST, Search algorithms, graph theory (basically D1 and D2 from a level maths (those of you that hated it, now you see how important it is :P)). The other big topic is also called time complexity, where you need to know how long an algorithm takes to run. I recommend a book called cracking the coding interview, it has typical interview questions and the answers.

Also heres my CV from the time I applied, but I've obvs changed it now.https://docs.google.com/document/d/1F5aK_fkpUpIMQq4XxkYDO-MYuCaipKw0zSDjkTPcjgc/edit?usp=sharing


Good luck to those applying!

I'm applying to Facebook for next year so need to learn for interviews again so I'm the same boat as you! :P
(edited 7 years ago)
Original post by bigboateng_
Ok so I guess I should put a general info here as someone who got a STEP internship.

STEP (Summer Technical Engineering Programme) is opened to EMEA (Europe, Middle-East, Africa) university students, basically every country that isnt the US for first and second year students. This is a chance for you to come an intern at google, get paid and gain some experience. The way the process works is you apply online, with just your CV, there isn't really any questions u have to answer, you literally just send your CV and your name, email. So your CV has to speak for you. Some people (non-software engineers) will take a look at your CV (if you apply early) so if your CV doesn't immediately scream genius, then well played atleast you tried. But the lucky ones who pass that stage will get an interview. You interview with 2 different engineers (on the same day) through google hangouts (live video) where they ask you to solve problems. Here is actually questions/code I wrote during my interview (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_I9YKNWVgyyxQzrvUuc2oac_Xh5PRsy3t36DXTSzcCw/edit?usp=sharing) I tried to remember the questions as much as possible. But yeah the interview assumes you are decent at a particular language, it has to be one of java/c++/python. And you knowing your data structures (LinkedList, BST, Search algorithms, graph theory (basically D1 and D2 from a level maths (those of you that hated it, now you see how important it is :P)). The other big topic is also called time complexity, where you need to know how long an algorithm takes to run. I recommend a book called cracking the coding interview, it has typical interview questions and the answers.

Also heres my CV from the time I applied, but I've obvs changed it now.https://docs.google.com/document/d/1F5aK_fkpUpIMQq4XxkYDO-MYuCaipKw0zSDjkTPcjgc/edit?usp=sharing


Good luck to those applying!

I'm applying to Facebook for next year so need to learn for interviews again so I'm the same boat as you! :P


You are actually such a lad, thanks dude :smile:

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Original post by bigboateng_
Ok so I guess I should put a general info here as someone who got a STEP internship.

STEP (Summer Technical Engineering Programme) is opened to EMEA (Europe, Middle-East, Africa) university students, basically every country that isnt the US for first and second year students. This is a chance for you to come an intern at google, get paid and gain some experience. The way the process works is you apply online, with just your CV, there isn't really any questions u have to answer, you literally just send your CV and your name, email. So your CV has to speak for you. Some people (non-software engineers) will take a look at your CV (if you apply early) so if your CV doesn't immediately scream genius, then well played atleast you tried. But the lucky ones who pass that stage will get an interview. You interview with 2 different engineers (on the same day) through google hangouts (live video) where they ask you to solve problems. Here is actually questions/code I wrote during my interview (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_I9YKNWVgyyxQzrvUuc2oac_Xh5PRsy3t36DXTSzcCw/edit?usp=sharing) I tried to remember the questions as much as possible. But yeah the interview assumes you are decent at a particular language, it has to be one of java/c++/python. And you knowing your data structures (LinkedList, BST, Search algorithms, graph theory (basically D1 and D2 from a level maths (those of you that hated it, now you see how important it is :P)). The other big topic is also called time complexity, where you need to know how long an algorithm takes to run. I recommend a book called cracking the coding interview, it has typical interview questions and the answers.

Also heres my CV from the time I applied, but I've obvs changed it now.https://docs.google.com/document/d/1F5aK_fkpUpIMQq4XxkYDO-MYuCaipKw0zSDjkTPcjgc/edit?usp=sharing


Good luck to those applying!

I'm applying to Facebook for next year so need to learn for interviews again so I'm the same boat as you! :P


How much algorithm and data structure knowledge do you need to know to pass the interview? I know about linear data structures like linkedlists, vectors, stacks, and arrays and I read about hashmap implementations. Should I learn about search trees and fibonacci heaps?

What time of the year did you have your interviews? Do you have to write the code under exam conditions?
Thats good, make sure you know their run times too. Worst case and best cases. I doubt they will ask you to implement complex data structure for the step internship but they definitely expect you to know what they are, either explaining it verbally or just using it. an example common question is return a unique array. So given [1,1,2,3,3,4,5] return [1,2,3,4,5]. My approach will be to use a HashMap or Dictionary depending on whether I'm using java or python. So they can ask you to implement it like HashMap<String, Integer> myHashmap = new Map<>() (etc...). You will not need to actually implement the HashMap class itself. However its good to know just in case. Yeah different search algorithms are a must, I doubt they will ask you questions past Binary Search Trees, but know how to implement Quick sort, bubble sort, linear search and bst at the minimum. The more you know the better.

One topic I recommend people studying is Dynamic programming, if you solve an interview question using DP, you will get HIGH ratings.
(edited 7 years ago)
Yes, I shall be applying :smile:

Thanks for making a thread!
What course(s) do you guys study at the moment?
I'm only 14 :frown: I guess I have to wait for 2020.

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