Interesting day at work today. I agreed to have a 14-year old kid "shadow" me at my job for a little over half the day to see what "being a game designer" is like.
A little background, for those who don't know, but I went to a high school where this sort of thing was incredibly common. Students were not only encouraged, but required to complete a series of several large projects before graduating. One of them would be to identify a "practical skill" and set about learning it. Another would be a "logical inquiry" where you would pose a hypothesis and learn how to statistically test it and report back on it. The relevant one here is the "career exploration" project, where you would set about trying to learn as much as you could about a potential career path you were interested in.
So... with that in my own personal history, I feel a bit of a "what goes around, comes around," "pay it forward" sort of vibe about the "help a student out" thing. Two weeks ago, our office was contacted by this kid who wanted to do a work shadow, and it fell to me whether or not I wanted to host him. I immediately said yes.
Well, I hope I didn't bore the kid too much. It's not all fun and games, making fun and games, as many of you reading this will know. Don't get me wrong, part of it is, but not all of it. And my daily routine often involves a lot of spreadsheet wrangling, number crunching, proofreading, and staring into space waiting for the next idea to come. I don't sit around and play Halo 2 all day, which is what I worried a little bit this kid was expecting.
Fortunately, he seemed a very bright student. He was attentive, and asked smart questions, and I didn't find myself regularly checking the watch to see "how much longer I would have to entertain him." But I do hope that he wasn't checking his watch going, "how much longer do I have to be here?"
1 comment:
My school had the same program. It was called "work experience" and we had a full week out of school to go to work (unpaid, of course) instead. Mine was godawful and I was looking at the clock from midday Monday onwards. The companies we visited were supposed to have at least 5 employees and somehow my placement fell through that crack. Me, aged 14, and a 50-year old beardy man without out-dated photo equipment. For one week. A lot was gonna depend on his personality and I was BORED!
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