Marlboro Teen Writes Code For Major Software Company

MARLBORO, NJ — Marlboro teen Riya Pawar spent a good part of her summer working nine to five. The code she wrote during that time now protect thousands who use software from Commvault, a Nasdaq-traded data protection and management software company where she interned.

During the six-week-long internship program, the Manalapan High School sophomore joined a group of 20 high schoolers and wrote ransomware code that would protect Commvault's important data.

"It was interesting to see how the things I learned in school in the Science and Engineering Magnet program were able to be applied into this real-world sort of sense and it was actually used in its commercial products," the 15-year-old told Patch.

Not all of the students doing the internship got the same opportunity to have their work be integrated into actual products.

"It was based on how well you were able to execute the code and how important it was for the Commvault data protection," she explained.

Pawar is part of the Science and Engineering Magnet program at Manalapan High School, a four-year program of interdisciplinary studies for students interested in pursuing careers in mathematics, engineering or physical sciences.

She was one of the youngest students selected for the Commvault internship and is was the only girl accepted into the high school engineering and math program.

The teen's parents were naturally overjoyed by her accomplishments.

"First of all even getting into the science and Engineering Magnet Program. Riya is one among 26 kids that were selected and is the only girl in that program," her dad, Rahul Pawar, said. "And then from that getting selected into an internship early on and being able to write code in the commercial product, those are all great things for us, we were happy about that."

Pawar also plays the piano — along with her 10-year-old brother — and recently competed in the Miss India Teen New Jersey Pageant, in July 2021, taking home the crown.

"I wanted to challenge myself and put myself out there and do something that I wasn't really familiar with," she said. "Preparing for this pageant help me gain the skills and I can still use them in my day-to-day interactions."

Pawar hopes to work in a field like computer sciences in the future.

"There's not just one major goal for me to achieve," she said. "It starts out by multiple small goals and then hopefully I can be able to do something where I'm successful and I'm stable in my life."

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