Harini Sethu wants to work in tech consulting, and she’s already giving life to her ambitions with a technology internship at a major U.S. bank.
Sethu is a fourth-year student studying web programming and design in Purdue University’s School of Applied and Creative Computing. In the Web Programming and Design major, students develop technical and creative skills in web development, 3D modeling, and computer graphics programming. They get hands-on experience creating interactive web applications, building dynamic websites using server-side technologies and using graphics software.
Sethu was initially interested in designing user experiences (UX) and creating interfaces, but she’s a big-picture thinker who wants to understand the entire ecosystem, from the developer languages to website aesthetics. Her curiosity about other roles in web programming attracted her to Purdue’s program.
“I realized that design alone wasn’t enough, and I wanted to understand how things actually worked behind the scenes,” Sethu said. “Learning how websites are built from the ground up has helped me stand out not just in class but in the professional world, too.”
The program gave her a chance to work on real-world projects in an internship at PNC Bank, an opportunity she says was her biggest academic challenge so far. Sethu initially had limited knowledge of the finance and banking industries, but she leaned on skills she developed in the classroom to counter imposter syndrome. Even without depth of industry knowledge, she says she built credibility by producing high quality work, asking questions, and focusing on strengthening relationships with her peers.
“One thing I’ve learned is that while doing great work is definitely important, it’s not always enough on its own. A lot of opportunities come down to who knows you, who trusts you, and who’s going to vouch for you when you’re not in the room.”
Sethu is focused on her connections these days—building relationships with professors and classmates, finding the courage to promote what she’s working on to others, and being available to collaborate. She believes people will see her value through personal connection and that will carry forward into a career.
Last summer, Sethu completed an internship in Sydney, Australia, with a startup company called SoCreative. She worked at the Macquarie University Incubator, which is part of Australia’s network of public universities and research institutions. It offers programs designed to nurture innovative thinking.
The internship abroad involved working alongside a project manager to redesign SoCreative’s platform, making it more user-friendly and visually appealing. Sethu had the opportunity to work independently, a shift from the many team-based projects she had at Purdue. She learned to balance client preferences with her own style while polishing her Figma skills, a process that required empathy and flexibility.
“One of the most valuable parts of the internship was the relationships I built,” Sethu said. “Our supervisors treated us like peers, which made it easy to ask questions and learn from them. Overall the experience was the perfect blend of challenge, creativity and growth and easily one of my favorite parts of the entire trip.”
Sethu has a team of encouragers who were instrumental in forming both her mindset and her skills. Her parents are both ambitious people, with her dad starting his own technology business and her mom carving out space in an industry where female minority leaders are rare. She spent 15 years leading risk and auditing at a company that provides services in assurance, tax, human resources, transactions, performance improvement and crisis management, and she’s now a senior vice president in banking.
“She’s shown me the importance of letting your work speak for itself, but also the power of owning your accomplishments,” Sethu said. “She’s always told me that if you don’t speak up about what you’ve done, no one will know. It’s why I’ve made it a priority to highlight the skills I’ve gained.”
Sethu says Ronald Glotzbach, an associate professor in the School of Applied and Creative Computing, has been a formative figure in her education. He taught her to understand and appreciate the tedious and seemingly irrelevant parts of web programming, like processor code, and helped students prepare for an artificial intelligence-forward job market by integrating AI in the classroom.
Sethu plans to graduate in Spring 2026, pursue a UX research position, and start building the foundation for a product management role later in her career. Until then, she’s maximizing access to a transformative learning environment, focusing on honing her web programming skills to make her vision possible.
