Suggestions for kids wanting to work in tech

[Thready]

Hey guys. I'm a psych grad student as well as a PC DIYer and I'm planning on specializing in children and adolescents. I also have a 12 year old nephew who is big into computers. My goal is to help kids find their passions and a lot of kids I know want to work in computers, but they don't really have direction. They feel lost in the big tech world.

 

I was wondering if you guys could do a video or maybe a forum post or something about how you all came to work at LMG, what your tech backgrounds are, what tips you have for people wanting to work in computers or who want to go to school for computers, just stuff that you think the younger generation should know if they want to go into tech.

 

I have some starter questions if that's ok but I'd really love just any thoughts you had on this topic. How beneficial is a programming degree? How have your DIY skills served you vocationally? How hard is it to stay on top of current trends in tech?

 

Thanks for any and all comments from anyone. And I welcome other forum users to comment here too.

[Lurick]

Expose them to all kinds of different tech, show them everything the world has to offer for tech jobs and professions (within reason obviously) and as they grow a bit older maybe have them sit with someone for a day and explore the job and see what it's like. Encourage them to branch out and try new things with technology, problem solve in different ways, and just keep them thinking inside and outside the box. Sometimes keeping problem solving inside "the box" is faster and better than trying to find a creative solution but know how to think outside that box is equally as important as knowing when to think outside the box.

 

For me, a network engineer, it's good to be very good with a particular discipline but also have a solid foundation of basic knowledge across other disciplines when you have time, you can't know everything but trying to know a bunch of stuff at least at a basic level and having a strong focus in one area is a great way to really prove your value. For me I'm a validation engineer and I've touched everything from data center design and implementation testing to 4G validation, wifi validation, core route/switch fundamental testing, security testing, and probably touched dozens of other non-DUT things along the way and picked up knowledge of VMWare, Hyper-V, SAN, etc. For my line of work being able to adapt is key and picking up as much as possible, like a sponge, is very important. Having DIY skills helps because it teaches me how to problem solve in unique ways by thinking outside the box.

 

Staying up to date on the latest and greatest depends on what you're doing because sometimes you don't have to be on the very bleeding edge but you can definitely be a little bit back, as technology matures, and learn a heck of a lot and still be just as valuable as that person on the very cutting edge. It's important to know your skill set and hone it and keep moving forward but branching out now and again is good too, as I mentioned before. In networking you generally know where things might be going and can start to shift that way but there is always that fundamental knowledge that doesn't really change so adding on top of it becomes easier as time goes on.

 

Technically my degree is still in progress as I'm in school right now to finish up my bachelors but I came out of community college with my Associates in Networking and a CCNA and CCNP and landed a job as a co-op/intern and from there it's just been one adventure after the other As for a programming degree, I wouldn't say it's necessary in most lines of work but having that foundation to know the general concepts of a couple different languages or how to apply concepts in a broad way can really go a long way. In my line of work I don't deal a lot with programming, yet, but as automation and API driven applications become more widely used and adopted by more companies and industries the more having some basic programming knowledge, of any language really, will help and being able to read an API doc and know how to interact with that is more important, at least to me, than focusing on a specific language right now. Sure python or something is good and used a lot but that could change tomorrow for all I know.

 

 

tl;dr: Expose kids to as much different technology as possible and encourage them to branch out and explore. As a network engineer you need a foundational skill set and then adding different technologies on top of that becomes easier over time. Don't focus too much on programming in depth for most industries but having high level concepts is great to start with.

[samcool55]

I would say, get him a raspberry pi, a bunch of sensors and a few guides how to get started.

It's not too expensive and can basically do whatever you want.

 

Wanna go pure programming? You can start with Scratch, very user friendly (it's basically drag and drop with blocks)

Wanna do some input/output stuff? A few sensors, GPIO and some very basic coding in python will get you there.

Wanna do network stuff, like your own DNS/DHCP server, containers, little NAS or something like that? Again, no problem!

Wanna program a complete website and host it yourself? Perfectly possible.

 

You can combine stuff as well, like reading sensors, reacting to it, writing it to a database, running a front-end for it and connecting all of that to your network is perfectly possible. It's a bit more complicated but hey, it's good to know it's possible.

 

The raspberry pi is not perfect, it's not meant for more advanced stuff but it's a great thing to basically explore the basics of most area's in the tech world and gives him the oppurtunity to try everything and decide what exactly he likes the most and knows which direction he needs to go.

 

Do you need a degree? Depends what you want (at least where i live)

 

Want to do support/helpdesk? No degree needed! Every muppet that says "hey i want a job in IT" can go to work on the support department.

Yes there's a reason why they basically accept everyone, it's an awful job.

Want to do sysadmin/network admin? Degree is almost a must.

Want to go the programming route? Degree is not a must, but recommended. That said if you can prove you know some advanced programming you should be fine.

 

Oh yea, there is also a business part of IT, like analyzing data, getting stuff to adjust depending on what data comes in. It's the one area of tech that's let's say, unique, and different than the rest, like really different. I dunno but most people that are special end up in this area of tech, hadoop is a good entry point to get into that world.

[Thready]

Hey fellas thanks so much for the replies. I'm going to read these a 2nd time and think about it.