June 1, 2026, was officially Day 1 of our AI/ML & Prompt Engineering residency at Virtual Height. Our lead mentor is Rashmi—she's a seasoned Python developer, Senior AI Trainer, and a PhD candidate. Right from the first five minutes, you could tell she knew her stuff inside out.
1. Making Sense of the AI Buzzwords
We started by demystifying the words everyone throws around online. In simple terms: Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the big umbrella for computers acting smart. Machine Learning (ML) is the math where computers learn patterns from data instead of someone writing endless rules. And Deep Learning (DL) is using multi-layered neural networks to handle complex things like recognizing faces or understanding full sentences.
We also discussed Narrow AI (today's tools like chess engines or ChatGPT) versus General AI (AGI, where a system can learn any human job). We even did a mini case study on Sophia the robot. My honest take: Sophia has impressive robotic facial servos and a pre-scripted voice box, but she's essentially a mechanical puppet. Modern language models that reason on the fly are miles ahead of rigid animatronics.
2. Running Python from the Terminal
After lunch, we jumped into the terminal. Rashmi showed how to execute scripts across Windows, Linux, and Mac using commands like 'py main.py' or 'python3 main.py'. We walked through core data types: integers, floats, booleans, and Python's four different string quotes (single, double, triple-single, and triple-double for multi-line text).
3. Showing Off Real Projects
The lab exercises were basic typecasting scripts, which I finished in a few minutes. While other classmates were still trying to figure out variable naming rules, I decided to walk up and show Rashmi some of the projects I've built. I pulled up my custom LLM chatbot—when you ask who made it, it proudly answers 'Sagar built me.' Then I showed my DeepSeek API reverse-engineering script, and finally walked her through my live portfolio at sagarithm.in and my design studio at pixartual.studio.
Rashmi's eyes lit up. She called over to acknowledge the work and praised my technical speed right in front of the classroom. The whole room went quiet for a moment. Having a PhD candidate and senior trainer genuinely respect your craft on day one was such an encouraging feeling. It proved to me that spending your nights building real things in public puts you way ahead of classroom theory.