The Friday before Thanksgiving, Meghan's middle school had a career day. This is the third time I've done it for the 8th graders. Unlike the elementary school kids, this is more focused on getting the students thinking about what they want to do post High School.
I took some of the slides from last year, but upgraded them to remove pictures of Meghan and talk about the new things my company has been doing about Share To Social on Facebook. I also told them about Caitlin Davis and how she blew everything with one picture.
Deb was in the first presentation, which was the first time she's ever seen me present in public. Then Meghan was in my last group. The first and last groups were very interactive, asked questions and responded when I asked them questions. The second group pretty much sat there and looked at me.
I did manage to freak out the teacher. The classroom is equipped with a 'smart' white board that detects when you click on it with your hands and fingers. I had not worked with one before, but I was able to quickly incorporate it into my presentation. It is easy to explain what a requirements document is, a testing environment etc. when you can show them.
The freak out came when I was talking about what a QA (Quality Assurance) team does. At a couple of different points in my career I have managed QA teams so it was on the 'how I got here' slide. So I explained quickly what 'negative testing' is, by walking up to the board and running my hands across it like it was a table of sand. The board flickered, changed views, changed colors etc. but eventually settled back down. I told the students this was what a QA person would do: something you would never expect. I thought the teacher was going to freak the first time. Even Deb said something later about her face as I did it.
I enjoyed doing this and will do it again next year if asked.
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