Eden Fuller works as a senior software engineer at NASA’s Space Telescope Science Institute, which operates space telescopes such as the Hubble. Based in Baltimore, Eden talked with Relevant Resume about how she went from studying English to working in software and what it takes to change industries.
In 2013, I graduated from a state college with a bachelor’s degree in English and no clear career path. I’d applied to some competitive master of fine arts programs and had been rejected by all but my alma mater, where I was offered admission without funding. I decided a master’s degree in poetry wasn’t worth the debt, but I had no idea what to do next.
Fast forward to 2026, and I’m a senior software engineer at the Space Telescope Science Institute, leading development on interactive outreach products for some of NASA’s most influential astronomy missions: the Hubble Space Telescope, James Webb Space Telescope, and Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope.
In 2013, I could never have predicted where I’d end up or the path that would take me there. Here are some lessons I’ve learned over the course of my deeply unexpected 13-year career.
Embrace Happy Accidents
The summer after college, some friends invited me to co-found a startup. It was initially a video game company, and my role was writing content for our games. As we pursued seed funding in an attempt to make the company commercially viable, the company’s focus pivoted to building developer tools for other game companies. This was an area where I had no relevant background, so I found myself learning new skills pretty much every week. I was helping write and design pitch decks, then presenting to startup accelerators and angel investors, then making graphics for software development tutorials and trying my hand at coding for the first time.
Before we got the startup off the ground, I needed a day job. At first, I did childcare on the side. Then, in 2015, I put together a portfolio of my design work. I landed a job as a junior designer at a mobile ad company called Millennial Media.
Cultivate Curiosity…
Millennial Media made interactive mobile ads, the sort you’d encounter between levels of Candy Crush Saga. As my first “real job” in tech, it was an incredible opportunity: I got to design ads for major brands like Disney and Mercedes-Benz, and I got to work alongside more experienced designers and developers. (I’m a huge advocate for remote work, but in the early days of my career, having mentors sitting at the desk beside me was a huge asset.) My colleagues were eager to teach me, and I was eager to learn.
At first, I got into coding because I wanted to "make the pictures move." I had ideas for animation and interaction that I could only execute if I learned some code fundamentals. Then Millennial Media was acquired by AOL, and the layoffs began. Our team started losing developers, but the volume of work remained the same. I picked up development work to help fill the gaps, and since help was urgently needed, my team was forgiving as I learned by trial and error.
…And Do The Work Yourself
I’m grateful I got to build my software development foundations in a pre-AI environment. Expertise comes through deep experience, and that means doing the work every day. As companies reduce hiring for junior engineering positions and pressure the remaining junior engineers to use AI in their daily workflows, I predict there will be an enormous drought of expertise in software engineering. That’s bad for the industry, but good for people who learn without taking shortcuts, and I think that holds true across industries.
Be Someone People Like Working With
Eventually I left AOL to work at my startup full-time. A year later, after countless 80-plus-hour weeks, I was burnt out and ready to move on. A previous AOL colleague who had great respect for my work there had become a manager at Mosaic Learning, a midsize regional company building e-learning products for unions and trade organizations, and invited me to apply. That became my first position with an official software engineer title, and after a couple years of experience there, I was able to get a job on the fledgling U.S. e-commerce team at IKEA in 2020.
I started as a rank-and-file engineer at IKEA. But when my team’s lead engineer was transferred out of our department following a conflict with team members, management gave me the lead role. Collaborating with another lead engineer and her team, I helped build location-aware store inventory information on product pages, a first for IKEA at the time. After that, I was moved onto a team to pilot collaboration between the U.S. tech team and the global organization based in Sweden, and helped build a framework for the teams to collaborate successfully.
You Can’t Crunch Forever
Behind the scenes, I’d spent years applying to jobs at nonprofits fighting climate change. I never landed one, but in 2022, I got a job at a climate-focused B corporation that partnered with fashion brands to refurbish and resell used garments. I was hired as the lead frontend engineer on the team that built their e-commerce sites. At first, it was the best job I’d ever had—but after leadership changes and layoffs, the working environment became untenable.
My boss and half of my 8 engineers were laid off, and the CTO committed my team to an impossible deadline. We began working mandatory nights and weekends—something I’d done at most of my past jobs, but after 10 years, I couldn’t sustain it anymore. I still wanted to do impactful work, but I needed a job that would make space for my life and health.
I decided to leave, and in an incredible stroke of luck, I found the job posting for a senior frontend engineer in the Office of Public Outreach at the Space Telescope Science Institute. It felt perfectly tailored to my past experience: building custom interactive content at AOL, e-learning products at Mosaic, and complex products for large audiences at my e-commerce roles. Ending up at STScI is the happiest accident of my career so far.
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