My Personal Mentoring Story, Career Choice in IT and Path to Microsoft - Part 1
Editor’s Note: The following article is written by me! With the New Year upon us, I thought this was a great time to share my personal mentoring story in hopes of inspiring others who may be undecided about their career options, think success is out of their reach, and how a great mentor can help you achieve your goals
MVP Mentors can help high school and college students develop and improve their technical, professional and soft skills. Fill out this short form to request your MVP Mentor. We apologize that the MVP Mentor Program does not provide professional consulting to adult candidates. If you are interested in learning more about the MVP Award Program please visit our site.
The year was 1996, a leap year, gas in the US was $1.22 a gallon, Independence Day was the highest grossing film, Macarena the top song, President Bill Clinton was re-elected, and I was a full time college student in my third year. My son was a toddler and my daughter was an infant, so needless to say it was challenge to manage a heavy course load and two children under the age of two. As a Psychology major, I knew I had many years of school left in order to obtain the PhD needed to have a successful career in this field. But in life, things can unexpectedly change and this was certainly the case with my story…
We were assigned a research report in one of my classes, and to me back then this meant going to the college library, hoping to get someone to assist me, and looking through the dreaded microfilm. Some of the other students talked about doing research on the computers but this sounded foreign to me. The librarian assisted me begrudgingly and I thought to myself that my lack of computer skills would hold me back if I did not overcome this. I ended up dropping out of college, not because of this, but again trying to balance academics and two babies proved to be overwhelming.
The four of us (my then husband and I and our two children) were living in poverty in a low income, high crime neighborhood. My husband was working two jobs and doing the best he could, but we still could not pull ourselves out from under this dark cloud. The Psychology degree was going to take too long and things were getting more and more dangerous here for the children. But what other field interested me where I could make a decent salary without 5 more years of college? One that would pay for my childcare, travel costs and still have something leftover to move out of this forsaken part of town? I thought about computers again and realized no matter what path I chose, that I had to sharpen my skills in this area.
Then came the decisive moment… someone in the neighborhood fired a gunshot and a bullet lodged in the wall to my son’s bedroom. In our neighborhood such an occurrence was routine enough that the police would not even come to investigate but simply told me to “come to the station and file a report”. That was when that mama bear instinct within me roared and I sprang into action. There was a very strong outlook for careers in IT and students just out of school were landing jobs with very high starting salaries. Instead of going back to college, I registered for classes in a specialized technical school.
These technical schools were new and all the rage. At the time they were very expensive, as much if not more than college tuition, but they promised job placement and in demand, high paying careers. To put this into perspective, these were the early days of the mainstream internet. The days of Netscape, the America Online disks at the supermarket, when having an email address was cool instead of common, most companies did not have a website, and the dotcom boom was still on the horizon. I did not have a computer of my own yet but started class anyway. The class was simply called “Client-Server”. I was the only female in a class of about 25 students. The instructor walks in and asks everyone to turn on their computer. I managed that part ok. Then he asks everyone to go into Notepad and type 5 questions they had. Well, since I knew nothing I didn’t have any questions to ask, and even worse, I did not know how to find Notepad!!
I wondered if made the right decision. It was intimidating to be the only girl in the class and everyone seemed to know what they were doing besides me. I felt exposed and was ready to admit I made a mistake, leave the class and figure out a Plan B. But a caring School Administrator, and some fellow students who took me on as a mentee, refused to let me give up that easily.
READ MORE IN PART 2
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Comments
Anonymous
January 06, 2015
Wow! Scary story re: the gunshot. And, welcome! You made the right choice. Also, great idea re: the MVP Mentors. I'd be happy to help flesh this out into the broader Microsoft ecosystem. As part of my role as the President of the Seattle IAMCP chapter we are actively trying to engage partners as well as engage our youth into the Microsoft ecosystem. Our local Women in Technology (WIT) chapter is doing an outstanding job here. They should be aware of the MVP Mentor program.Anonymous
January 06, 2015
Thanks Jeff for checking out my story. I love WIT groups!! I will send you a FB message to talk more about the Mentor ProgramAnonymous
March 02, 2015
Really great story! I am father of 4:) I had degree in Electronics/Telecom engineering and when came to United States It was impossible for me to find a job in my field. Then I see the opportunity in IT field. Did my masters and start working in IT. It is really hard to explain to kids how technology job can help them to live a better life and specially when there is big need for IT jobs. I have 12 year (girl)and 13 year (boy). Hopefully they will understand this on time and don't have to struggle what we have gone through. I live in Charlotte,NC. I write blog http://sqlage.blogspot.com/ and have youtube channel www.youtube.com/.../UCtoDB5EEbt8C9fX72xjacLg , trying to build free resources in IT. I have trained more than 50 IT professional over 3 years. Loved the idea to start working with kids and guide them. If you can guide me little how I can become the part of this program, will be great. Once again. Story was great and can inspire so many people. Thank you Aamir