As employers increasingly seek AI-ready talent, two externship programs created by Outamation, an AI-native mortgage operations technology company, in partnership with Extern, a platform that connects students with real-world work experience, have provided 4,046 students with hands-on experience building artificial intelligence tools. The programs were designed to close the gap between learning about AI and actually using it on the job.
Instead of studying AI in theory, students applied it to sample mortgage documents created for training, built working tools and delivered their findings directly to Outamation, the same way a professional technology team does. Outamation and Extern designed the programs together, with students working on curriculum designed by Outamation’s mortgage domain experts and AI engineers. Nirmal Patel, Outamation’s Chief AI Officer, led program design for Outamation, with leadership and support from Devang Kamdar, Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer. Mike Eng, Head of Partnerships, led the effort for Extern.
The programs included two levels of learning: a seven-week Foundational externship introducing AI, natural language processing and computer vision, and a five-week Advanced program where students fine-tuned their own AI models and built multi-step AI agents to automate document workflows. Students trained AI to recognize common mortgage document types and wrote Python code to pull out key information automatically. They also built AI systems that answer questions about documents and tested open-source AI models, skills that apply across finance, real estate and other industries.
Participants compared AI models on accuracy, cost and ease of use, and Advanced participants presented their recommendations to Outamation stakeholders. The programs were open access at scale, with students from 934 schools and 59 countries taking part, regardless of location or background. This global participation underscores the growing demand for practical AI education and the importance of making such opportunities accessible to a diverse talent pool.
“Every student today will build a career alongside AI. The question is whether they learn it by doing real work or by watching from the sidelines,” said Lisa Guadagno, Chief People Officer of Outamation. “4,046 students chose to do the work. Our job as employers is to give the next generation the tools and the opportunity to succeed.”
“AI skills on their own are not enough. Students learn the most when they solve real business problems with people who know the industry and people who know the technology,” says Sapan Bafna, Founder & CEO of Outamation. “Our mortgage experts and AI engineers designed this curriculum together. Students learned to use AI the way it is used on the job.”
“Most companies stay out of this because they picture a program they would have to build and staff. Taking that burden on is what Extern is for. Outamation handed students a real problem and got independent evaluations of the AI tools their own team is weighing in return. Having to make a recommendation and defend it to the people who will act on it is the part no course can simulate,” said Matt Wilkerson, CEO at Extern.
Building on these results, Outamation and Extern will work together on a new program designed to evolve alongside advances in AI, so students continue learning the skills employers will need next. Students interested in future programs can learn more at www.extern.com. For more information about Outamation, visit outamation.com.
This initiative matters because it addresses the critical skills gap in AI, providing students with practical experience that makes them more competitive in the job market. For industries like mortgage operations, which are increasingly reliant on AI for document automation and customer service, such programs help build a pipeline of talent familiar with the specific challenges of the field. As AI continues to transform the workplace, the collaboration between Outamation and Extern serves as a model for how companies can contribute to workforce development while also gaining valuable insights from student evaluations of AI tools. The success of these externships highlights the potential for scalable, accessible AI education that benefits students, employers, and the broader economy.
