Graduate Uses Technology as a Tool for Meaningful Change
Deshna Ashok Shah, MS’25, information systems, achieves her dream of learning how to use technology in a way to positively impact humanity through powerful curriculum and vigorous research opportunities.
Deshna Ashok Shah is a current graduate student in the MS in Information Systems program. Before joining Northeastern, she earned a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering from Mumbai and worked as an Assistant System Engineer at Tata Consultancy Services. There, she led technical projects, including the implementation of secure mobile banking features and the development of full-stack solutions.
Shah’s decision to pursue further studies at Northeastern was inspired by a long-standing dream rooted in her upbringing in a small village in India, where owning a computer was a rare luxury. Northeastern stood out as the ideal choice—not only for its strong Information Systems curriculum, but also for its balance of academic excellence and real-world experience. Boston felt like the perfect city to explore endless opportunities, and NEU offered the right environment to nurture her ambitions both technically and personally.
Northeastern’s curriculum has been the perfect catalyst for Shah’s professional aspirations in full-stack software development and applied research. The blend of technical depth and real-world exposure has enabled her to build practical systems while critically examining the societal impact of technology. Courses like Web Tools, taught by Teaching Professor Yusuf Ozbek, and Business Analysis & Information Engineering, taught by Adjunct Professor Debbie Knowlton, transformed how she approached both coding and business strategy. These classes empowered her to apply technology to meaningful, real-world problems—the very essence of what she always hoped for.
Shah completed her co-op at Extreme Reach, where she worked as a Full-Stack Developer using C#, .NET, OrmLite, Angular, and SQL Server. She contributed to the full migration of legacy .aspx MVC pages to a modern Angular-based application. She also collaborated cross-functionally with UX designers and QA teams to develop features and write Cypress end-to-end tests. Securing this co-op was no small feat; she received four offers despite a challenging job market. What helped her succeed was her dedication to continuous learning beyond her comfort zone, along with consistent technical practice and interview preparation.
One faculty member who made a lasting impression on Shah was Professor Ozbek. His approach to teaching backend systems and Java fundamentals was rigorous yet incredibly rewarding. Under his guidance, she built a volunteer job-hunt application featuring a secure login system—one of the full end-to-end software solutions.
A research project that particularly stood out to her involved documenting the portrayal of augmented reality (AR) in science fiction and action films released between 2000 and 2024. The goal was to create a comprehensive, searchable database of AR concepts with potential applications for designers and developers. A major challenge arose when Shah and her team needed to connect Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) submissions to spreadsheet-based approvals in real-time. To solve this, Shah developed an automated system that integrated MTurk’s API with spreadsheet logic, enabling instant approval or rejection of submissions and significantly improving workflow accuracy and efficiency. This experience sharpened her backend development skills and deepened her ability to solve real-world operational problems through code.
Group Project
In a Data Science course, Shah worked with her team on a project aimed at modeling and predicting global refugee migration. The challenge was not just technical—it was deeply human. The team aimed to understand how factors such as Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and regional conflict impact migration patterns. Using Python and libraries such as Scikit-Learn and NumPy, they developed a linear regression model that improved predictive accuracy by 78%. To make their findings more accessible, they visualized insights using Pandas and Matplotlib, ensuring non-technical audiences could easily understand the data. The experience taught Shah how technical tools can serve humanitarian goals—and how data can drive informed policy decisions.
Individual Project
In her Advanced Big Data Indexing course, Shah built a prototype of a distributed system capable of ingesting, storing, indexing, and analyzing massive datasets in near real-time. She worked with technologies such as Redis for caching, Elasticsearch for inverted indexing, and Spring Boot to develop secure REST APIs. Key challenges included minimizing writing latency and ensuring a schema-less data model that could be easily extended while maintaining security with OAuth 2.0 and designing for scalability. Every component was built from scratch as part of a weekly learning sprint. By the end of the course, Shah had implemented a full-stack, schema-less, secure, and scalable solution.
These projects weren’t just academic exercises; they sharpened Shah’s backend engineering skills, reinforced her passion for systems design, and taught her how to solve problems that scale to real-world demands. She walked away not just with functioning systems, but with a deeper understanding of how to build tools that truly serve people.
Throughout her academic journey, Shah has been fortunate to have mentors who recognized her potential and encouraged her growth, especially during moments of self-doubt.
“Northeastern’s culture—supportive, ambitious, and deeply collaborative—has helped shape not just my skills, but my mindset as a lifelong learner and innovator,” Shah shares.
Extracurricular Activities
Beyond the classroom, Shah has engaged in a wide range of extracurricular activities that reflect her passion for growth, leadership, and community impact. She had the privilege of volunteering at major tech conferences, including the Augmented World Expo (AWE) 2024, where she engaged directly with innovations in AR/VR. She also served as a lead volunteer for the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), helping organize software engineering sessions—and is honored to return this year in the same role. Most recently, she will be volunteering for the Grace Hopper Celebration (GHC) 2025, the world’s largest gathering of women in tech—a milestone moment in her journey.
Shah also held the role of TEDxNortheasternU Speaker Coach, where she guided speakers through idea development, delivery, and storytelling—an experience that strengthened her communication and mentoring skills.
These experiences have been deeply enriched by Northeastern’s experiential learning culture. The university’s hands-on, project-based curriculum and encouragement from faculty to connect technical expertise with real-world applications enabled her to thrive in fast-paced, cross-functional environments, whether on stage, in the lab, or at the frontlines of innovation.
Future Perspective
Shah is currently enrolled in the Agentic AI course, where she applies large language models, retrieval-augmented generation, and real-time streaming APIs to architect production-ready chatbots and conversational design patterns. This hands-on experience positions her for a career as a Solutions / Application Engineer and ensures she remains at the forefront of today’s rapidly evolving AI landscape.
Shah’s time at Northeastern has shaped her into a well-rounded software developer who sees technology not just as a tool but as a force for meaningful change. Her future lies at the intersection of impactful engineering and people-first solutions. She aspires to lead projects that democratize access to education, healthcare, and sustainability through design and innovative platforms.
Shah shared that in her acceptance essay, she wrote, “I know one day I will make my father proud.” With all she has accomplished and the completion of her master’s degree, she is beginning to fulfill that promise—and it’s all thanks to the foundation her father gave her.