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Internship Spotlight: Madelyn Forrester at Salesforce

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Madelyn Forrester is a fourth year student in the ACES Minor majoring in computer science and statistics.
This summer, Forrester is an intern at ACES Corporate Partner Salesforce. As part of the Computer Security Incident Response Team (CSIRT), Forrester helps her team--an operational team that works 24/7 to ensure the safety of the company--react to security incidents that are detected daily.
“When an incident occurs, my team and I track the incident through stages of investigation, containment, and remediation,” Forrester said of her responsibilities. “This allows me to see the impact of all types of security events and also teaches me the best ways to minimize a security incident on a business.”
Like so many others this summer, Forrester experienced a bit of a hiccup come March of the Spring 2020 semester: her internship with Salesforce was moved to an online environment in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Though Forrester was at first hesitant to approach an unfamiliar environment online, like most things, Forrester’s success at her internship came with practice and patience: “After a few weeks, I was able to get into the swing of things and actually work on several incidents and projects. Right now, working virtually is great, and gives me more time to spend on cooking and baking after work.”
Working virtually is not the only benefit Forrester has found in interning with Salesforce. In fact, from the moment she learned that Salesforce would be at the ACES Career Fair in fall of 2019, her interest was piqued.
“After learning Salesforce would be present at the ACES career fair, I did a bit of research on the company. I was blown away by the company's success and their mindfulness of their employee's well being,” she stated. “This sounded like a great opportunity, but what really stood out to me was their company policies on volunteer work. Volunteering is something that is very important to me and I was hoping that I would be able to find like minded people at Salesforce.”
Alongside attending events like the career fair, Forrester had access to a number of different opportunities as an ACES student, many of which helped her to gain skills that she uses daily at Salesforce.
“Although my ACES classes were not directly related to the responsibilities of my position at Salesforce, the background knowledge these courses have provided me, allows me to quickly understand and respond to an incident at hand,” she stated. “HACS408E helps me on a daily basis understand how an attacker is thinking and allows me to more quickly respond to incidents.”
Alongside her work with ACES and Salesforce, Forrester harbors a passion for helping others, and she has been volunteering since she was a teenager. Since coming to University of Maryland, Forrester has found a myriad of opportunities to continue this passion. Most prominently, she runs the Girls Who Code club, educating middle and high school students who identify as women on basic programming skills. In that vein, Forrester additionally helps to plan community outreach initiatives and  for the Maryland Center for Women in Computing, demonstrating a persistent dedication to making the field a more welcoming environment for womxn-identifying individuals

Published June 29, 2020